


The Shortest Distance

by compo67



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Attempted Murder, Bottom Jared, Dust Bowl, Explicit Sexual Content, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Minor Character Death, Natural Disasters, Reverse Big Bang Challenge, Suicide, Supernatural Reverse Big Bang Challenge 2014, Survival, Survivor Guilt, Top Jensen Ackles, Widowed, death of children, death of livestock, not a fairy tale ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-31
Updated: 2015-02-04
Packaged: 2018-03-09 19:23:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 27,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3261524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/compo67/pseuds/compo67
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The year is 1935 and the Great Plains are hurting. Beaten down, dirt and dust-laden, the people of these Plains live in a constant haze. Jared is twenty years old and struggling to keep his adoptive family alive and cared for. When his husband Cole died, much of the faith in this land died with him, though they have stayed because this is their land. They stay because they belong here. Cole’s cousin arrives in from Montana two years too late, seeking to uproot his kin and change their lives. With nature against man and man against nature, no one remains the same.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

**February 1935**

Two pigs follow Jared through the chicken coop.

Pigs aren’t fond of chickens; too noisy, too unpredictable. Their hooves clack against the wood planks as Jared tosses pellets and collects eggs. One pig—the smaller of the two—snorts through a pile of hay, somewhat upset that today it’s seed being thrown instead of corn. The other sticks close to Jared’s boots. It makes light grunting and squealing noises as it walks. These pigs were a wedding present. In two years, they’ve grown from piglets to hams on hooves. Cole used to feed ‘em table scraps. Jared hasn’t killed them yet. He, nor anyone else, says out loud why the pigs have been allowed to live.

There is no softness to Jared. All of it has been sucked outta him and spat onto the dying land around them. He was green once.

The hens lay less every day.

Down six this day. Jared marks it with his pen knife on the doorframe before he leaves. The pigs are smart enough to trail ahead of him a few steps, so the door doesn’t shut on them. Their tails bob in the air as they trot, pleased with themselves and their intuition that chores in the coop are done. As Jared’s steps become longer, their grunts increase in frequency. The little one boasts to the bigger one by keeping its haunches directly in front of the other’s face. For walking bacon, they keep up alright.

On the way from the coup to the house, all Jared’s boots kick up is dust.

That’s all there is anymore—dust.

It’s in his hair, on his skin, and in the indentations at the sides of his mouth. It’s even on the fine, pink hairs on the pigs, who sneak inside the kitchen with Jared. Being inside doesn’t mean escaping the dust. He’ll scrape it off his eggs soon enough.

The pigs don’t seem to notice that one of their kin—a pig Jared traded a day’s work for—is currently in the frying pan, sizzling and cooking to a crisp. Instead, they are more concerned about staying out of the way. Jared sets the eggs down on the counter and pecks his mother-in-law’s cheek. Dust is there, too.

Cole was never bothered by the dust. He made do in it, like anything else. And he enjoyed pressing his lips to Jared’s cheeks to see how long it’d take for an outline to form. There could have been a dust storm with the devil at their backs and Cole would have paid no mind so long as his hands could have been on Jared’s backside. They weren’t always so thin, none of them in this two room house were. And not everything was always about scraping and stretching. In lighter moments, when the lamps were off and they were settled in their mattress with the busted spring, Cole would lick the dust off of Jared in places fit for couples married before God. Dust was there, as Cole pressed his long, lean body against Jared’s, into the bed frame. But Jared didn’t mind that. Every single time, in the reprieve of night, he half-heartedly protested that he didn’t think God made marriage for acts like _that_.

‘Course Cole never cared. He married Jared under an apple tree instead of in a church.

Dora makes no comment as Jared tosses each pig half a biscuit. “Chores are done,” Jared announces, scrubbing at his face with his sleeve. The color of his shirt used to be white; now, it just turns different and darker shades of beige.

Two eggs are fried and plated alongside bacon just for him.

“Frank’s still trying to get the truck to turn.” She says this with an edge to her voice. She probably told Frank to come inside half an hour ago.

Coffee is set down, plus a plate of biscuits. She’s a good cook. Even dusty biscuits are palatable when she makes them. He nods his thanks and begins to eat. There is no more waiting for others, and grace is only said on Sundays. Too much sand coats their plates if they wait more than a minute. And it always makes the coffee rough.

“He need to go somewhere?” Jared’s cheeks hurt from dust and wind whipping across his face this morning while he was out with the cattle.

Chickens may be loud, squalling things that bite and peck at his hands, but they live in luxury in comparison to the cattle. The barn caved in under the weight of dust left behind by the deluge of blizzards last summer. People involved with numbers estimated twelve millions pounds of dust moved last year alone. It was a difficult summer for everyone, not just those in the way of Kansas Dust.

This isn’t Kansas.

This is Texas.

And Jared knows that the dust blows all over. Foolish Northerners and Easterners think that someone could just stop the dust. Pour concrete, they say. Cover the soil, they say. Bring in rocks from the mountains. That’ll stop the wind, the dust, the whip and lash of nature.

Three feet of dust fell onto the barn. It was packed dense enough to buckle the roof, which had already seen three summers like this one.

All of Cole’s work splintered and crumpled, killing half the herd.

The remaining half has had to make do outside, until Jared can save up enough money to buy nails. It isn’t the lumber that’s expensive—that he can get cheap from the old rail yard. All he’d have to do is haul some old boxes home, dismantle them, and use that wood. Nails, tar, and tools are what set him back.

Everyone is deeper and deeper in dust.

Two inches of dust are scraped off the counter with a butter knife.

It falls to the ground with a _whush_. Dora will sweep it later. No woman in Sweetwater beats the dust away from a home like her. Jared never makes any remark about why; she knows more dust will be back and her hands are hurting from scrubbing raw.

She used to be clean. They all did.

The lines on Dora’s face pull taut, like the fencing Jared has been working on. “Frank must be in Abilene by noon. That’s when the train comes in.”

Sometimes, Jared can hear Cole through his mother’s speech.

“Train?” The pigs nose at his boots; he nudges them back with his heel.

“Yes.”

“What for?”

“Don’t feed those pigs your eggs, Jared, eat up.”

“I’m done. No use in wasting.” The eggs taste off, but not from their preparation. He takes his fork and cuts what’s left up, then sloughs it onto the floor. There won’t be any mess when the pigs are done. Even if there were, the dust would soon cover it. “What’s Frank got to do with a train in Abilene?”

“Nothing if he don’t get the truck to turn. Hand me your plate.”

She serves her own breakfast on the same plate. As she sits in her place at the table, Jared pours her coffee. Abilene is a fifty mile drive East that takes a good hour or so to get to—if the truck holds out. A traveler could make it alone, but the dusters don’t have schedules. Folks have been trapped in their cars a mile or two from home or town.

They found Millard White last week, slumped over the wheel of his Ford, suffocated, his mouth and eyes open, stuffed with dust.

Jared will go with; afternoon chores will have to wait.

The pigs finish the eggs without complaint. They sound their appreciation, but become fascinated with the idea that Dora might also give them a share of her plate. In excitement, the little one pushes the big one into Dora’s skirt, causing it and Dora to panic.

Jared scoops up both pigs and pitches them outside before they become supper.

He watches the big one reprimand the little one in a cloud of dust and dirt.

 

Grass used to grow here.

The whole country was thick with it. By the way Cole described it, it must’ve paved with gold wheat. At two dollars a bushel, anyone with a plot of dirt could grow wheat and start to build their lives. Cole had hoped to turn their farm around, small as it was, and to build them all a proper house. This patch of land had been in the family since Frank came back from the Great War. Jared was three years old when the War ended. Just like the War, Jared never got to see this land at its peak.

When Jared rolled into town—with fifty cents to his name and another day’s work in his back before collapsing—sometime in January of 1932, the country had turned.

The bumper crop of 1931 deceived them all.

The heat came. The wind came. The dust came.

Cole was as stubborn as the government men telling farmers that the soil was indestructible. The soil, they said and Cole repeated every night at the table, was the one natural resource that would never, ever quit on them.

He never gave up on the earth he’d been raised on.

Wheat would grow again, he was sure of it.

The scarce few times it rained, Cole said he could smell those stalks in the ground taking hold and waiting for their chance to prove everyone wrong.

He was sure there’d be a day again when the sun didn’t hurt.

What hurts Jared now isn’t just the sun, but the screech of the noon train coming in. The force of all those tons of steel slowing to a stop rattles his bones. He rode a train once; never got back on.

Frank pulled a muscle in his back while fighting with the truck’s engine. He was made to drink a cup of water from the well and lay down. Soon as he would be able to, he’d take over Jared’s chores while Jared ran the errand in Abilene. It was a small miracle that Jared was able to coax the engine into turning over and staying on.

There is little that Jared would not do for Frank, most of it with a quiet nod or a simple, “Yes, sir.” This errand is different. It’s like gray clouds overhead that don’t produce rain; all they do is taunt and make the wood warp. He snapped at the pigs before he climbed into the truck and slammed the door. Pigs don’t belong in trucks and they certainly don’t belong in Abilene.

It was Dora who clarified the errand while Jared got ready. She passed him one of Frank’s shirts—it was cleaner—as he washed his face in a basin. She spoke softer and more reserved as she detailed the station and the platform.

“Our nephew is coming in. We meant to say sooner, but his letter was in the batch that got held up. We only opened it two days ago.” Mail didn’t reach their town for a month because the dust was too thick; the first attempt to get through smothered both the horse and the postman.

Dora had no picture to give to Jared for the station.

All she had were words that stung them both.

“He looks just like Cole.”

 

All kinds of people unload from the train. Black folk come to Abilene for jobs they couldn’t get in the Deep South and pay they were refused up North. They can buy land here. That’s what drove Preacher to town, though now he’s thinking of trying out for California. Not to pick fruit—shit, even white folks can’t get those jobs anymore. But he’d take what he has from the saloon and start out there, maybe in San Francisco. He tells Jared these things whenever Jared stops in for a drink.

One drink is always given to Jared on the house; Preacher never forgets.

People in clothes so fine step onto the platform; Jared is amused to think that it’ll all be ruined in a matter of days. Dust clings to everything. Abilene gets the storms first.

If only Cole’s stubbornness and hard-headed faith could’ve made it rain.

Of all the land in the world he had to love this lonely, lovely land.

Someone asks Jared for directions. Jared tries his best. All he knows is the road from Sweetwater to Abilene. Abilene isn’t the biggest place Jared has passed through. But the people bother him. The sight of the hotel and their crystal chandeliers, with people sitting down to lunch, turns his stomach more than bad eggs.

When the committee came asking last week, Dora and Jared gave two jars of preserves, a chicken, and one of Jared’s shirts. There are five chickens left in the coop. Seven cows. Two spoiled pigs. Yet here some people are, pretending like they too, don’t have dust on their fancy clothes.

Last night’s dinner was chocolate milk, peppered gravy, and twice-floured biscuits. That’s what Cole used to call it, anyway. What they actually had was dust milk, dust gravy, and dust biscuits.

The last few passengers mill around. Men offer to carry bags to destinations for a few pennies.

Perhaps something happened to this cousin. Maybe he heard about their town—about the whole stretch of this land. Maybe he decided, somewhere along the way, that two years after his cousin’s funeral really was too late to show up, so he might as well keep on going towards somewhere else.

Maybe he never intended to come.

Five people remain on the platform. Four of them wear the railroad’s uniform. One wears a gray suit, standing beside a large brown trunk.

“Cole,” Jared catches himself breathing out.

He inhales dust.

 

“Wheat’ll grow again, Jared.”

“Cole, it’s more than that. We lost six cows this week. Your mother’s stretching the stew so thin it’s dust and potatoes. Your birthday’s comin’ up and… you got to know there’s nothin’ extra.”

“I know we lost those cows. I was there, remember?”

“I’m the one who put ‘em down.”

“Won’t always be this way. I promise.”

“The land’s changed.”

“And it will change again.”

“All of us could move. Wouldn’t have to be far.”

“That’s not my way and you know it.”

“Our bills ain’t getting’ paid. The tractor’s dead. Even the rabbits are gone.”

“Sugar, do you trust me?”

“Don’t do that.”

“Answer me, husband of mine.”

“…you’re a bastard.”

“Aw, c’mon. Don’t insult my ma, she loves you like her own.”

“You ain’t got no sense, Cole. Why’d I marry you?”

“That’s a fool of a thing to say, sugar.”

“I trust you, dammit. I just don’t trust the land.”

“Trust it like you trust me. The Stovers need extra hands with their cattle next week. We’ll make some money and then you can buy me that solid gold hat I’ve been after.”

“Buy you a hole in the head, Cole Ackles.”

“My Uncle.”

“What?”

“Did my Uncle Frank send you?”

One of the uniformed railroad workers helps the man with the trunk, lowering it to the ground with care. For the trouble, the man tips him a dime. One whole dime for two minutes of work. A couple of pennies would have done just fine.

Rank, foul nausea turns over in Jared’s gut. This isn’t right. It’s not right at all. What kind of man rides in on a black, steel beast dressed in a fine pressed suit, without dirt or grime underneath his fingernails, not a lick of dust in his reddish beard, and shoes polished as bright as his straight, white teeth when all these years his kin has been blackened, boiled, and fried?

He speaks with a Northerner’s flat accent. “My name’s Jensen. You are…?”

“I know your name. That all you brung?”

“Uh, yes. Just the one trunk.”

“Haul it in the bed.”

“…You wanna give me a hand with it?”

“You brought it here, didn’t you?” Jared pushes off the side of the truck and opens the driver’s side door. It creaks worse than it did last week. He climbs in. There is enough gas to get them back to Sweetwater—if the battery doesn’t die and if the engine holds out. By the looks of his passenger, he’ll be no help if they encounter a storm on the way.

His lips are too thick. And his eyes aren’t blue.

The man grumbles like the pigs grunt and eventually, he loads his trunk onto the bed.

He could do it by himself after all.

 

If Cole had lived this man wouldn’t be here.

If Cole had lived maybe it would’ve rained.

If Cole had lived Jared wouldn’t sleep alone.

If Cole had lived Jared wouldn’t have to see his face reflected in a stranger’s.

If Cole had lived Jared wouldn’t be driving fifty miles in silent resentment.

If Cole had lived the wheat would’ve grown.

If Cole had lived, if Cole had lived…

If Jared had died.

 

 

Theirs is a two room shack on a five acre plot of land.

On the side of what used to be a driveway lie the blistered bodies of field mice and groundhogs. They curl up, stiff and crisp, dried to the point where even the stray dogs won’t touch them. Nothing that sits out in the sun that long is good to eat. Jared tried it once. He heard somewhere that the Romans used to eat field mice for dinner. If it was good for Caesar, it was good enough for him. But those Roman mice weren’t beaten by drought and dust. The things that die around them ain’t fit for eating.

Stepping out of the truck, Jared kicks at the dirt near the pigs. They squeal and turn, the bigger one in the lead, squealing to each other about their sudden harsh treatment. Knowing them, they’ll run under the chicken coop and hide until the sun sets later, when they’ll come out looking for Jared—shelter and dinner.

Cole’s cousin was smart enough to keep his mouth shut the entire ride back from Abilene. All on his own, he deciphered that it was best not to talk to Jared; speech also meant sucking in dust. Enough noise was made anyway, from the engine continuously trying to choke and Jared refusing to allow it. Whatever conversation they might have had was not missed.

The gas held out. The engine didn’t quit.

After Jared parks inside the tiny, frail garage, the man lugs his trunk out of the bed.

 

The four of them sit down to an early dinner.

Words of greeting are exchanged plainly. No one moves in for an embrace, though Jensen does extend his hand to Frank’s. The trunk stays in the hallway for the time being, and Jared sees that Dora went to trouble for their meal. A chicken was killed and fried, which has made the kitchen feel ten times hotter than it is outside, grease and flour sticking in the air. Dust settles onto their meal and Jared can practically hear Cole making a comment about seasonings.

Dora even laid out a table cloth—for company.

The signal is given to start eating by Frank. Their plates and cups are turned over. Dora set them facing down.

Biscuits and a bowl of beans are passed around. Everyone eats without a word, eager to finish for their own reasons. An extra piece of chicken is passed over to Jensen, who accepts it with a quiet thank you. Frank has two pieces as well; Dora and Jared make do with their portions. However, she tries to give Jared another biscuit. He shakes his head. He’ll have a glass of milk after the last of his chores.

Frank speaks to Jensen in a mutter, pushing food around on his plate. “You workin’?”

This man’s clothes won’t last long here. They’re too fine for the country. Even his trunk barely looks like it has been used. Jared assumes that he bought it cheap off someone before he left.

“Yes, sir.” Jensen takes a drink of water, coughing and clearing his throat. His voice is deeper than Cole’s, rougher, and with less of a twang. That’s what being up North does to someone. It isn’t half as pleasant or encouraging to hear. “Uh… I got a job on a ranch in northern Montana, stone’s throw away from Canada. Folks who own it are real good to me.” He coughs into his napkin. “…Been there three years now. I handle the books and train the new hands. We even get people from out East who pay money to take a two mile ride. I… we’ve had to set all that up since… uh, since the wheat stopped growing. But uh, before that, I was a ranger so I never really had a steady place. When I heard about Cole…”

Frank drops his silverware on his plate. The clatter causes everyone to flinch.

Outside, the wind wails. It scrapes against anything it can gain friction from. The grass is gone; there is nothing to block the wind and what the pestilence it brings to their feeble, meager shelters. Dust begins to seep and slither in through the slits in the doors, windows, and walls.

“You’ll stay in Jared’s room,” Frank says, pushing away from the table with his large, cracked hands. He gets up. Walks away. “Work starts at dawn.”

And that’s the way of things.

 

The second day in, Jensen asks to see where Cole is buried. He asks Dora first.

Right away, Jared wants to say no. He doesn’t have to think about it twice. But it’s not entirely his decision. Cole belonged to more people than just him.

Dora is placing down strips of quilts she’s cut up and soaked in used water from their baths earlier that week. Whatever can be done to help stop some dust from getting in must be attempted. Maybe, she has told Jared before, it’s not much, but a few grains over time make a difference. This is her home. She will see to it.

Holding a sticky, wet, strip, Dora closes her eyes at the question.

Their nephew, it seems to Jared, has come here to do nothing more than stir up trouble for everyone. Why bother? Why not just let them all carry on as they had before? No one asked for his help.

No one is going to leave.

Dora does not make eye contact. Her mouth is set in a firm line.

“By and by, either Frank or Jared can show you.”

A look is cast towards Jared.

Jared turns and walks out of the house, slamming the door shut behind him.

See if he has more luck with Frank.

Won’t that be something.

 

Every day, there are chores to do.

Underneath the afternoon sun, Jared works.

He sweats dirt and dreams of apples by the barrelful. Apples are versatile. There could be pies, pastries, strudels, muffins, applesauce, apple juice, and just plain apples. Jared could eat them until his insides threatened to burst. All the land will give now are little green apples; not fit to be eaten unless he wants to spend a day with stomach pains. Of course, the pigs eat them just fine whenever Jared tosses a few to them, without a word of complaint.

That is the one tree on their entire property. Jared dumps their used bathwater onto it. It’s the healthiest thing around.

The pigs remain out of Jared’s sight still, unwilling to meet Jared’s bad mood again, two days after the man has arrived.

Jared ties a red piece of thick cotton around his nose. It drapes over his mouth. This doesn’t mean dust won’t get in, but maybe he won’t end up coughing so much. Before he settles into the chicken coop for the night, he’ll help Dora hang wet rags over the windows and against the sills once again. It is a nightly process. Thick rugs are rolled and stuffed underneath the front and back doors. They all know they’ll wake up tomorrow with a fine coating of dust over them no matter what measures are taken.

But it’s something or nothing.

Three years ago, Jared met Cole.

How they met doesn’t matter much.

Cole bought Jared a drink at the saloon that Preacher has since taken over. It was the first and last drink Jared would let any man buy him.

Back then, there were some trees. Those trees played their part in blocking the wind, creating buffer between the sweep of heat and dirt and the bodies racing to find shelter. When the trees dried up and refused to grow anymore, the rabbits came. Hundreds of them, desperate, half-mad with rolling eyes and long, twitching feet. Cole lauded their arrival as a blessing—fresh meat! For days they had rabbit stew, rabbit pies, rabbit dumplings, and fried rabbit over biscuits.

The rabbits ravaged the land.

Every hint or hope of something green was consumed. Not a stalk was left of their labor.

They ate everything. They even ate the bark off of fencing. They tore through laundry hung to dry, desperate for food, their red eyes rolling around in their heads.

It nearly broke Cole.

He watched his land turn into black, thick blood. The rabbits did not descend in small groups. After the first wave, something frail in Sweetwater snapped. Men from town came in groups with clubs, bats, and two by fours. Every swing met a rabbit’s head. A rib cage here. A foot there. It was carnage. Rabbits screamed. At least a thousand died between their land and the Stover’s all in the span of two days.

Whatever wasn’t sent out as meat was buried under the sun, left to buzzards and swarms of grasshoppers that followed.

Under the same sun that Jared works now, the cows are dying. The process is tortuously slow.

One of the milkers stumbles in her tracks. Jared dismounts and rushes to keep her steady. Low, pained mooing is followed by ghostly wheezing. He could count the bones in their spines if he wanted.

Soon, all that will be left of their cows will be their white, polished bones over the fractured, exposed ground. He’s had to kill any calves born right away and bury their corpses throughout the property. This one that he’s holding up—just a minute more, girl, just a minute more—had one last year. It was a pretty calf, spotted white.

Minutes after it was born, Jared shot it between the eyes.

Now, its mother collapses.

 

Three black birds circle overhead as Jared cuts through skin, joints, and muscle.

Elbows and forearms seeped in blood, he continues working as he hears footsteps approach. He knows that sound of his father-in-law’s walk—and Dora would never come out to the workspace while he’s taking care of a cow in any capacity. She raised most of these cows with Cole; there are names for all of them. Jared forgot them a long time ago.

Pieces Dora can’t use are thrown into a slough bucket. He’ll toss the contents of the bucket over a fire pit outside the coop before he feeds it to the pigs.

A black bird squawks, shrill and sharp.

“Can I help you?” The voice isn’t any more pleasant or welcome than the caw of the birds.

“Don’t need it.”

“Well…I’d like to thank you for picking me up at the station.”

“Just doin’ what Frank asks me to.”

“Yeah.”

For two minutes, Jared continues his work without another word between them. He’s butchered cows many times before, more so in the last two years. A man from the government occasionally comes through town to pay for cows that can’t be eaten; sometimes he’ll pay up to five dollars for a cow on its last legs. For cows that can be butchered and sent to Washington D.C., he’ll give out as much as sixteen. Jared and Frank drove two cows to town the last time word came through that the man had made an appearance. They rode away with twenty dollars more and two cows less.

After this, Jared needs to go out and patch a hole in the fence on the eastern border.

“You sure I can’t help?”

Another bird screeches. Jared wishes he was one of them. He already scavenges the land; what more could he lose? Standing up, holding a strip of meat in between his hands, Jared takes a look at Cole’s cousin, unconvinced of the gesture. 

“I said no.”

 

Days pass.

Dust blows.

A man on the edge of town, someone Jared didn’t know, is found dead after a storm. His widow finds him tangled up in the rope between their barn and house. He was twenty feet or so from the front door. Someone mentions the amount of dust that gets into the eyes of corpses out in storms.

Jared does his chores.

He doesn’t say anything to anyone for two days.

 

**March 1935**

Visits are rare.

Preacher tells Jared that Sweetwater has hit a record for visitors in the past week. Last month, Cole’s cousin came in from Abilene, all the way from Montana. Two days after, Mrs. Anderson’s eldest son—who lives out West—arrived, ready to take his mother back with him. And now, Mr. Forest’s grandson has rode in from two towns over to ask for supplies that can be spared. A handful of migrants have also been seen in the saloon and other parts of town, asking for work here and there. Preacher gave a man a nickel and a shot of whisky for the floor to be swept good.

“Yet no one has brought me the secret to unending wealth,” Preacher sighs, brushing dust off of his main countertop. “Guess I’m stuck here another day.”

“Reckon so.” Jared holds his glass of whisky, but derives no pleasure or comfort drinking from it. He walked in ten minutes ago and sat down at a stool usually reserved for him.

Preacher is the only man in town who can buy a drink for Jared.

Anyone who tries is given a firm suggestion to take their drink and knock it back unless they wanna lap it up from the floorboards.

Since the previous owner left, Preacher has wanted to paint his own name on the sign, but he never had the time or the money to paint. All it says is SALOON, in letters that could stand a fresh whitewash, but it wouldn’t matter. The dust would wipe it out. Same as anyone else, Preacher has wet rags against the two windows in the front. There are four plain tables in the space, with a piano in the corner, the furthest away from the door and the dust. In the evenings, Rosalita, the schoolteacher, comes to play.

“You gonna sit there and stare at your drink, or you gonna drink it?”

“I’m fixin’ to, just give me a minute.”

“Hmph. A minute. Given you years.”

Jared looks up, eyes narrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Why you haven’t spoken a word to Cole’s kin?”

“…what?”

“You heard me.”

There’s another saloon in town, about half a mile up the main road, but fights break out over there more often. July Fairbanks—the owner and bartender—over serves and over charges. At Preacher’s, a nickel gets Jared two glasses of dark whisky that’ll numb the hiss and sputter in his skin. There isn’t money for birthday presents, but there can always be a little something to get tipsy enough so that the world tilts and the dust temporarily sloughs off.

“He come here talkin’ to you about that?” Jared closes his fist around the shot glass in front of him.

With a shrug, Preacher answers. “He come in here to use the phone once or twice. First time I saw him, I thought…”

“I _know_.”

“Like a damn ghost.”

“All he does is get in my way.”

“The past does that from time to time.”

Damn Preacher.

“You know three days ago,” Jared says with a bite, leaning in, over the bar, “I saw a truck get tossed forty feet down the road by the wind alone. I think that’s more important than talking to someone who’s gonna hightail it outta here the second shit gets worse.”

There hasn’t been a storm yet today. All the same, Jensen has been coughing and wheezing like the rest of them, but his clothes are still their original color. The only thing Jensen has done—besides disrupting their daily lives—is open up subjects that upset all three of them, Dora especially.

Maybe he forgets that it’s her boy buried out there.

The saloon door is pushed open.

Preacher slaps his hand down on the bar and laughs. “Speak of the devil.”

Brushing off dust from his shoulders, Jensen walks over.

He sits one barstool away from Jared. “Anything good about me that I missed?” he asks, a playful manner to his voice. Preacher stops tending to the bar and pours Jensen his own shot.

“Just telling Jared that you’ve used the phone here, that’s all.”

A nickel is placed on the counter. “I’ll buy…”

“You don’t wanna do that,” Preacher interrupts. “Trust me. You’re new still. A month doesn’t make a lick of difference to most folk not from around here. Drink what’s yours. Don’t worry about the sourpuss next to you.”

“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here.” Jared knocks back his whisky and grimaces at the burn. If he could, today would be a good day to blackout over what Preacher’sw serving. He wipes at his mouth.

Back to scraping at the counter, Preacher shakes his head. “Then speak up, son.”

“Got half a mind to shoot you,” Jared grumbles. He taps the edge of his glass and slides it back.

Preacher shakes his head. “Let that sink in a bit. I’ll refill you when you’re ready.”

“What the hell, Preacher?”

“Now, now, don’t raise a stink. Enjoy some company now that you’ve got it.”

Customers from the street come in. Preacher deposits Jensen’s nickel into his pocket and leaves them. As irritating and nosy as Preacher is, his presence is immediately missed.

Jared looks straight ahead at his empty glass, shoulders hunched. It’s not that Jensen hasn’t helped at all. He’ll wash the dishes for Dora after every meal, and he fixed a broken step on the chicken coop. And despite his Aunt mentioning that he shouldn’t take after Jared’s bad habit, he’s tossed a few pieces of biscuit down to the pigs during dinner.

It’s just that he has no right to be here.

Finally, Jensen kicks back his drink. He hardly reacts to it.

“Good whisky,” is murmured.

Jared shrugs.

A minute later, Jensen clears his throat and turns on his seat to face Jared. “Can I invite you for a walk? Maybe you can show me around town?”

Wiping his mouth, Jared coughs. His mouth feels slippery from the dark brown liquid he just ingested. It’s better than the crinkly feeling after he drinks a glass of milk. “What are you makin’ phone calls for? Fixin’ to leave?”

Life would not change for them if Jensen left today, tomorrow, or a month from now. He would go back to his cushioned life out on someone else’s ranch and they would go back to hunting for tumbleweeds in the dirt to feed the cows.

Jensen has three suits he brought with him. This is his cleanest one; it’s a dark blue and doesn’t quite fit his shoulders right. It’s been mended several times. Maybe he bought it when he was a boy. “I called my boss. Told him I’d been staying longer than I had intended.”

“He fire you?”

“No.” Jensen looks surprised. “He… he ain’t like that at all. I’ve still got a job when I get back.”

“Sounds too good.”

“Decent folk often do.”

“Is he your husband?” Jared never noticed a wedding band, but that doesn’t mean much. Jared’s is buried with Cole. There was only money for one, and Jared is pretty sure it was made out of tin, but it is in its proper place.

Standing up and laying down an extra penny on the bar, Jensen shakes his head. “No. He is not. I think… I think he would have liked that a few years ago, but no.” His beard is coming in thick, except for two bare indents on either side of his mouth. “The offer still stands for a walk, while there’s time enough to do one.”

The sky was blue this morning.

That’s a good sign.

The weather can change at any moment, but there is less of a chance for a storm to hit if the sky is clear at dawn. Jared has a feeling Preacher won’t be serving him another drink, even if he asked for it. His head is swimming enough as it is, being next to a man who looks so much like a man he buried two years back.

“Fine.”

Like he knows something Jared doesn’t, Preacher nods at them both as they walk out.

 

President Roosevelt says to plant trees.

He is convinced that trees are the answers to the dust. Trees are strong; gnarled and stripped of all their leaves, they stand year after year against the oncoming walls and waves of dirt and debris.

But Jared knows better.

It will take more than trees to bring the soil back. The cycle just doesn’t end. He’s had it explained to him by Max Stover, the youngest of the Stover clan and an amateur scientist. During the War, Europe needed wheat. Prices for wheat soared and every man with a plot of land turned to grow wheat. The government said it was the right thing to do. Settle the land. Turn the sod. Everyone bought up more land than they needed, and more tractors and equipment than they could afford.

The land was worked too hard.

When the War ended and Europe started to grow its own wheat, the price of wheat plummeted and took everyone with it.

Two dollars a bushel was the start of a nightmare.

A year ago, the dust reached the President’s doorstep.

Without trees, the wind whips through acreage. It wrenches seedlings from the weakened soil and doesn’t ever put them back where they belong. Jared has spent hours picking up seeds in hope that one day he’ll be able to plant them properly. This year, he’s pried six bushels of wheat from each of the five acres they own. For thirty cents a bushel, Jared might as well have spent his time burning the damn things.

What trees are left are scarred with lightning. Jared wants to know what the point is in that.

The whole word is connected to a farmer’s life.

The whole world is a furnace.

Sweetwater is hurting.

Their walk is a tour of sad, hungry faces and bitterness as coarse as the inhaled dust.

Jensen’s fine boots take long steps next to Jared’s scuffed up shoes. They pass Mrs. Lucas’ fabric store. Jensen freezes in place on the sidewalk, staring at the side of the building. His mouth hangs open in shock.

“The hell are those?”

Looking up, Jared shrugs at the sight. “Snakes.”

“They are nailed to the building.”

“Yep.”

“Any reason?”

“Someone from Mariposa said it’d bring rain.”

“Oh.”

“You ever eaten snake?”

“Can’t say that I have.”

“Weren’t you a ranger?”

“Yeah, but I usually had… never mind.”

They start to walk again. Jared mentally lists what Jensen probably had to eat—biscuits, corn bread, beans, salted pork, dried beef, and rich, dark coffee. His stomach rumbles. Whisky on an empty stomach was a terrible idea. He coughs to clear his throat and ignores the rattle in his chest that follows.

Last night, Dora made porridge. She mixed in pieces of potatoes and beef to thicken it. Although it tasted good for what it was, Jared spent the entire meal pretending it was ice cream. In the summer, whenever there was time to spare, they used to make ice cream. It was Jared’s favorite thing.

For his birthday one year, Cole managed to buy berries and mix them in. He added more milk than usual so that the end product was more like soup.

They licked the sweet stickiness off each other’s mouths that day, sitting on the back step, unbothered by the dust mixed in.

Everything has changed. There is no more ice cream.

Milking the cows is no longer the chore it used to be. Their udders are red and sore from the dust and wind, made worse by the lack of suitable housing. Sometimes they wander through the property, confused, mooing into the beige void. No one has the money for supplies yet. Frank hasn’t said a word about fixing the barn and Jared won’t press.

“Jared, I was hoping you could…” Jensen’s voice interrupts Jared’s thoughts. “…tell me some more about yourself.”

Eyes narrowed, Jared mutters. “Like what?”

“Uh, well. Maybe… let’s start with how old you are.”

“Be twenty this year.”

Dora writes down Jared’s birthdays in a book she keeps wrapped in a spare blanket. That’s where she keeps all of their important documents, including the pieces of paper that say Cole and Jared got married, and the one that says Cole is dead.

Cole’s birthday was at the beginning of the month. He would have been twenty-five.

Jensen’s birthday is two days before Cole’s. Dora remembered. She made him a cake the size of his hand, scraping together the ingredients, unable to prevent dust mixing in with the flour. It didn’t seem right—this birthday. Wrong one. All of this. Just wrong.

“Twenty is a good age,” Jensen comments, continuing their walk. “You must have been young when you came into town, then.”

Once again, Jared shrugs. He doesn’t have anything more to say about anything. They’ve circled around town and ended back at Preacher’s. It’s a mile from town to home; Jared brought them in the truck just to give the engine some time to run. Jensen had business and Jared just wanted a drink. They should get back before dinner.

Still, Jensen pushes to talk more.

“Do you have family? Other than my Aunt and Uncle, I mean.”

“No.”

“None?”

“You want me to leave? Is that what all this is?” Jared’s shoulders bristle. His words push past his lips and sense. “You think I got no business stickin’ around here now that… that… well, I got more business being here than you do.”

“Well, I…”

“I didn’t have to stay,” Jared spits out. “I could’ve left right after.”

“…I didn’t…”

Looking directly into eyes that are the wrong color, sharply, he asks, “What _did_ you mean?”

He could have left. He could have rolled into another town just like he rolled into this one when he was sixteen and starving. He could have taken the money from Cole’s life insurance policy and gotten far, far away from Sweetwater—like Jensen did.

Jared stayed because he wasn’t the only person grieving.

Frank and Dora lost their only son.

Without Cole, their household was down one hand. Jared had to stay. The Ackles had taken him in when he needed it. By June of 1932, Cole and Jared were married. Dora baked a cake for their wedding and Frank gave them a rifle and a pistol each. Cole’s parents became his parents. The money from the life insurance policy went to the mortgage that year.

It was blood money.

In a rush, Jensen tries to speak. Jared silences him with a hand held up. His entire body stiffens. The chambers in his heart slow in their compression. He can feel it—the pick up of wind, the shade stretching out from the corners of buildings.

All Jared wanted from his marriage was to wake up next to Cole in their too-small bed, on their pokey mattress, morning after morning and not have to check the floor for snakes when they got up to do chores. He didn’t want anything big from life.

Transfixed by the change in the wind, Jared stands completely still.

“Get in the truck,” he says to Jensen once and only once.

A storm is coming.

 

Fire from heaven.

The sky knifes them.

Cowardly, the sun hides behind the first wave. Blocked out. Hidden.

They came in from town scraping away from the first wave. Jared ditched the truck in the garage and immediately went out to the chicken coop, where the horses are kept tied.

Jared races now to gather the animals. He needs to bring them here, to the side of the barn still erect, the only refuge he can offer them. He saddles up, digs his heels into the ribs of his horse, and starts out into a wall of dust. The bandana across his nose and mouth do little to protect him. Dust pummels Jared and his horse from every direction. It leaves bruises and welts as it sinks into the cracks and cuts in Jared’s skin.

Overwhelmed, the horse can’t ride straight.

Two cows broke free when the pressure in the air spiked. It takes Jared ten minutes to lasso one and drag it towards what’s left of the barn. The roof might be broken and they might be crushed, but that’s a merciful death in comparison to what the dust means to do to them.

In search of the second cow, Jared can vaguely see another ride nearby. If it’s Frank, Jared will cuss him out when they’re done. He’s supposed to stay inside with Dora. Someone has to stay with her. Someone has to lay down rags inside, over the windows, stuff the cracks in the walls with paper, and cover the doorknobs with sheets.

As the sky dims and the sun quits, Jared forces his way further into the land.

This isn’t what Cole knew.

This is a wasteland.

This is a black blizzard.

A swollen, distended pocket of wind threatens their balance. Jared teeters. He kicks his left leg out, struggling against everything to keep himself and the horse from falling over. He can’t see more than fifty feet in front of him. But he can see the difference between walls of dust and clouds overhead as lethal and predatory as black birds.

When the rain falls, Jared is genuinely shocked to feel it. How?

His relief disappears as hail begins to fall. Pelted, bitten by the sting of hundreds of pellets, Jared is overcome.

Somehow, over the yowling torrent, Jared locates the cow. She is huddled against a tree, mooing and moaning in panic. Jared tries to lasso—twice—but fails. He might as well be asking for a clear breath of air. Two more attempts are made. He feels the line of his body arch and twist as he attempts to swing his rope against the wind. Every ounce of skill works with what muscle he has left. Out, he extends his elbow. Two loops. Palm open, loop swung towards her…

He misses.

Something knocks into him and his horse.

“GET AWAY FROM THE TREE!” Jensen screams from a top a horse, his mouth and nose covered, his voice nearly lost in wash of hail.

“I HAVE TO…”

“GET. AWAY. FROM. THE. TREE.”

No one tells Jared what to do.

He’s ridden this far out, he’ll see the job done.

This is their stock.

Against his instinct, Jared dismounts. His horse shrieks and tries to pull away, but Jared holds steady onto the reigns. The tie Jared had his hair in flies out. The hat he wears on rides is next, lifted up like the truck he saw on Main Street. His hair sticks up in all directions, held up not just by the wind, but by something that crackles in his ears.

Dust and hail churn. Mud begins to form. The sky opens.

“JARED!”

Cole?

Arms wrap around Jared’s shoulders and haul him backwards. It’s his reflex to buck against the hold. Jared’s rope slips off his wrist. The horses shriek. Jared’s mouth opens to scream as he witnesses what he’s only heard of.

Lightning strikes.

The tree erupts into flame and smoke—split in half, the ground around it charred.

Fire from heaven wipes them out. They hit the ground hard, rolling around in hail and mud. Stunned, neither one of them moves.

Sunlight recedes.

No Man’s Land.

Someone from the North came up with that.

 

A religious man came into Sweetwater once.

This was back when Jared and Cole were married, for almost six months at that time. They were at Preacher’s, taking a rest, when the man drove up in a weathered Model-A. He was dressed in red from head to toe, looking like a bloated tomato. Over his chest was the biggest wooden cross Jared had ever seen; the man claimed it was part of _the_ cross.

Inside the saloon, he addressed the sinners inside drinking alcohol. Cole sat back in his stool, unworried. He had one hand on Jared’s thigh and the other on his pistol.

Waddling from his large, fat frame and the weight of the cross on him, he stepped into everyone’s view and opened his mouth. “I send a pestilence into that land, and pour out my fury upon it in blood, to cut off from it man and beast. Ezekiel 14:19.”

Everyone was unfazed. Joe Noble hooted for the man to show some skin if he was gonna stand there. Once more, the man with the cross spoke to the saloon. Jared wanted to see if the cross was thick enough to block a bullet.

“With pestilence and with blood, I will enter into judgment with him; and I will rain on him and on his troops, and the many peoples who are with him, a torrential rain, with hailstones, fire and brimstone. Ezekiel 38:22.”

Cole was sure that this was not God’s plan for them. The land would prosper once more. Out of the worst struggles came the strongest men. This was simply their struggle.

Joe Noble and Tim Lucas stood up and suggested that they show the man of God what it was like tied to the outside of a building during a duster. Preacher waved them off and told them to take it outside—“It had better not be _my_ building.”

Somehow, that man of God escaped with his life, fleeing in his Model-A, praying to God that he didn’t wet himself.

Fragments of his words are all Jared thinks of when he wakes up.

_I send a pestilence into that land._

He rolls over, wherever he is, and vomits. Dust doesn’t pour out of him like he expects. It’s mostly blood that comes up, and something foul, gray and slimy. The mess of it hits the floorboards with a sick squelch.

_A torrential rain, with hailstones, fire and brimstone._

“Stop swallowing it, get it all out.”

That is not Cole.

“You don’t like to listen to what’s best for you, do you? Open.”

Fingers press at Jared’s mouth. He fights, but the strength has been wrung out of him. Every inhale and exhale is painful. His nostrils flare and he turns his head, but the fingers win. They shove inside his mouth and down his throat, causing Jared’s shoulders to twitch and his stomach to flip. He heaves, choking on mud and blood until the fingers scoop it out of him.

“Again.”

Jared didn’t cry when he had to kill Bethany last week.

He didn’t cry when he killed her spotted white calf.

He didn’t cry when he knew the grass would never grow again.

“It’ll be all right.”

Slumped against Jensen, sitting up in a bed he used to share with Cole, Jared cries.

 

The dust follows.

The dust follows.

The dust follows.

Dust to eat.

Dust to breathe.

Dust to drown in.

 

The storms double.

This is the time of year when the scent of wild plum bush, violets, and blue grass should be perfuming the land. This is when everything around them should be waking up from their spell in the earth, growing and sprouting strong and sure.

Fourteen inches of rain fell this year—the lowest ever on record.

Nothing grows.

Three days pass.

The black blizzard smothered all their chickens. Every last one of them. Before Frank even walked into the coop, he knew what had happened. Chicken coops are not quiet.

What makes it worse is the knowledge that the chickens did not die in peace. Even if they pecked more often than they had any right to for their lodging and food, they didn’t deserve this death. If Jared had known. If he had known that was how they’d die, he’d have wrung their necks then and there.

Dust filled the chickens’ lungs grain by grain until there wasn’t an inch left to breathe. Frank found them scattered everywhere, some of them with their necks twisted from the gusts of wind that entered from a loose board in the ceiling.

Max Stover clocked the winds from that black blizzard at sixty-five miles per hour.

These three days after the blizzard are a glimpse into what many in Sweetwater are calling punishment from God. But none of the storms that follow after are like the black blizzard.

Today, the pigs follow Jared out to the hollow chicken coop.

He holds a rifle in one hand and a biscuit in the other.

The pigs’ grunts and squeals escalate as he begins breaking pieces of the biscuit off. The big one pushes the little one out of the way for a larger piece; the small one retaliates by ambling ahead, tripping over itself.

Remarkably, the pigs survived the blizzard. Jared holed them inside before they went to town, shoving them underneath his bed.

He sits on the second to last step of the chicken coop. The rifle rests over his lap.

Without chickens, they’ve lost a source of meat. No more chickens. No more eggs. Every single scrap of chicken was eaten—even the feet. And to be good townsfolk, Dora donated two to the migrant family living in the schoolhouse; the mother is heavy with a child and the father has nothing to feed any of them. What little everyone in Sweetwater has, they pass on to that family. Jared couldn’t imagine having a child in this rage of nature.

He stares at the pigs and their beady black eyes.

They nose at his boots.

They trust him. They trust him to feed them scraps and keep them out of the dust and not to turn them into bacon.

Wheat is down to twenty cents a bushel.

Summer is three months away.

This is the time of year when cows should be grazing on renewed grass.

Last year, in Mariposa, fields were poisoned in an effort to kill the crush of millions of grasshoppers. What the residents of Mariposa realized too late, was that the poison killed the hoppers and everything else. Nothing more would ever grow there. Not for another lifetime at least.

Jared raises his rifle. He tosses the last hunk of biscuit.

“You’ll regret that.”

Six weeks and this man from Montana has not left.

“Go away, Jensen.”

“I’m telling you,” Jensen steps out from the corner of the coop, “you’ll regret it.”

“Do you want breakfast tomorrow or not?”

“Not enough to make you do that.”

“Who asked you? Huh? Did anyone ask you?”

“You just did, sourpuss.”

“Go. Away.”

Jensen walks up to Jared and places his hand on the barrel, nudging it away from all four of them. He looks at Jared. He trimmed his beard last month after learning it was best to lop it off. This makes him look not as stern, but still as annoying. Stupid is the man that steps between a hungry man with a rifle and some pigs. This isn’t any ordinary rifle either; Frank gave it to Jared. It’s an old Marlin, long, tan, and powerful—took Jared a good few weeks when he first got it to stay on his feet while shooting. With a .40-.60 caliber and 24-inch barrel, this is the gun that gets the most use on the farm. A blast is quick.

“Jeff wired me money. We’ll go buy some supplies. You can leave your rifle.”

“I never go anywhere without a gun.” Jared nudges open his vest, revealing his pistol.

Second wedding present—Colt Model 1915 Navy. The caliber’s less, at .36, but the five inch barrel allows for a quick draw. Cole’s rifle and pistol are in the garage, tucked under a canvas sheet.

Jensen seems unimpressed. “Just get off your ass, will you?”

The pigs snort their displeasure—the biscuit is gone.

It shows how dependent they’ve become on Jared if they won’t run away from the sight of his rifle.

No one asked him to kill them.

But it seems selfish not to.

The little one nudges at the big one with its nose.

Jared turns away.

“He sent you money?” Jared grouses out, refusing to look at Jensen. “Just like that?” He stands up, coughing, and slings his rifle over his shoulder. Once again, the pigs follow him, never to know how close they came to being a plate of bacon. “Why didn’t you marry him? Are you stupid or somethin’?”

Sighing, Jensen shakes his head.

“It ain’t always about the money, Jared.”

“So you are stupid.”

“Yes, Jared, I’m stupid.”

“I figured.”

“Yeah, you did.”

 

Folks from up North or from the East call them “next year people.”

If it don’t rain now, it’ll rain next year.

If the dust don’t stop now, it’ll stop next year.

A farmer’s life centers on that tiny, little word: if.

If it rains.

If it rains.

If it rains.

Strip the land bare.

Turn up the sod.

Plant wheat like God.

A farmer is a gambling man.

Rain follows the plow.

Dust does them in. Buries them up.

Hold on.

Because if.

If it rains.

If it rains.

If it rains.

Jared is familiar with the word—if.

 

 

Three dollars won’t buy back the grass or banish the dust.

But it does buy their household more than they’ve had since the government paid them to kill their own cows. Three dollars buys them flour, sugar, eggs, pork, beans, apples, potatoes, soap, lard, and a block of hard cheese. With one of Jared’s dollars, he buys gas for the truck, shells, and a bottle of whiskey.

Before checking out, they lingered for a while in Mr. Herman’s store, listening to the thud of the doors opening and shutting whenever people stop in or leave. A large, faded sign for flour hangs behind Mr. Herman at the register. Jensen comments that that sign—and Mr. Herman—have been here since he was a kid.

The Ackles family was two boys: Frank and Alan. They lived in New York City. They were as close as brothers could be. Their wives even gave birth to boys only a few days apart. Jensen and Cole were frequently mistaken for twins. New York City is where the Ackles lived until they were called to serve in the War. In 1917, Frank and Alan shipped out. Cole and Jensen were seven years old.

Only one family got their man back from overseas.

By 1919, Frank moved his family and his brother’s family out to Texas. They started in Dallas, but moved further west, encouraged by the oceans of wheat and grass. Out to Sweetwater, the Ackles settled down in a shack Frank built, a shack Jared continues to patch up.

The boys grew up together. Jensen was Cole’s very best friend. Until Jensen’s mother decided she had enough of this land. She had no tie to it. She had no love for it.

In 1920, the boys were separated. Jensen and his mother moved up to Chicago.

Cole was ten years old the last time Jensen saw him.

Letters were exchanged twice a year, until Jensen’s mother died in 1928. After that, Jensen never had much of a permanent address.

A story is told in the canned fruits and vegetables aisle.

“My Uncle Frank used to raise turkeys, when we first got here.”

Jensen has freckles that stand out, despite the fine layer of dust all over him. He has a bow and curve to his legs, but sure and confident footsteps—the footsteps of a lawman. What he brought with him is now just like the rest of Sweetwater: frayed, beige, and dry.

“I don’t know,” he says, ducking his head, smiling all the while, “if Cole ever did mention it, but when he was small, he was fascinated by the damn things. He loved those turkeys more than the newborn calves. So, in my wisdom of being two days older, I told him—stand outside with a turkey long enough, and you’ll become a turkey. He said to me, ‘That’s stupid! What if I get eaten?’ I said, ‘Aw, figures you’d be too chicken shit to try. No one would eat _you_. We can all tell the difference between a turkey and a turkey-boy.’”

Laughing, Jensen shakes his head. Crinkles form near the edges of his eyes.

“You wanna know how long he stood outside with those turkeys? Five hours. From noon to supper, he was standing out there, in the middle of a turkey pen, convinced that God would turn him into a turkey. And of course, being the good kid I was, I told him, right before supper, that if he stared at the sky and opened his mouth like the turkeys did when it rained, he might speed up the process. Worked like a charm.”

Jared laughs so hard, he forgets.

He forgets he nearly shot the pigs today.

He forgets he can’t sleep in the coop anymore and slept in the kitchen last night.

He forgets that they can’t ever pay Jensen back the money he’s spent.

He forgets about the look on Frank’s face when a letter from the bank came this morning.

He even, in this moment, forgets about the dust.

 

Making their way up to the counter, they meet Rosalita in the last aisle.

She has a husband out West. He moved from Mexico to find work there, while she moved here to take care of her mother, who passed away last year. There hasn’t been enough money for anyone to move back anywhere, not even to meet in the middle. Despite her situation, Rosalita’s face has retained a tender quality to it. She nods politely at Jensen and motions to Jared to join her, away from the counter.

Every Saturday she goes to Preacher’s and plays piano. Cole used to tip her a penny every time.

As Jensen pays, Rosalita makes a comment to Jared. Her words are alarming.

“It is so good to see you smile again.”

 

A migrant man Jared has never seen before loads up the truck while Jensen pays in cash. The man works quickly and doesn’t make eye contact. Jensen gives the man two pennies.

Pennies go a long way, and yet not nearly far enough.

 

In the truck, Jared’s smile withers.

“Jared, did y’all ever try to sell?”

A look at the sidewalks of Sweetwater and Jared shudders. Masks from Abilene have arrived. Some ladies from the Red Cross are giving the out to women and children first. A line a country mile long stretches from the Mr. Henderson’s Barber Shop all the way down. Jared can see some men at the end of the line.

Those who leave the line with a mask put them on immediately.

Half of Sweetwater walks around with thick, black masks strapped over their noses and mouth. To see their eyes smile from behind a mask is eerie. Some folks even have goggles. Jared finds it terrifying to look at too long.

The letter from the bank informed them—in fancier words than Jared can remember—that they have two mortgage payments left on their land. Payment on time would be appreciated, or the bank will be forced to take action. Cole’s life insurance paid most of the mortgage off, plus some life insurance for the three of them. What was left has been paid one way or another since, scrimping and saving what they could. But if there was money this month to pay the mortgage, they wouldn’t be using Jensen’s money to buy food.

The Travis’ lost their farm last week.

This week, Jared hears the bank is after the Browns, though they’ll have a hell of a time getting old John Brown off his plot.

Mrs. Lucas went out of business. She boarded up her fabric store and left. Jared doesn’t know where she’s gone to, just that no one could pay their credits and no one else was buying fabric when food must last as long as possible. Every last dusty handful of flour from the bins is used. Every last piece of meat is eaten.

Those snakes on the side of Mrs. Lucas’ shop never helped.

What do folks from Mariposa know.

Irritation boils, bubbles, and works its way back up again, churning in Jared’s gut. Jensen is driving because Jared doesn’t want to deal with the engine today. Dust kicks up around them and the wipers give a sorry attempt at scraping it away from the windshield.

“What do you think?” Jared bites back.

“Fair enough. But why not?”

“Why didn’t you come back from Montana when you knew?”

“…because I got involved.”

“And you want us to sell now?”

“Well… what else is there?” The truck sputters. Jensen gives it more gas. “Y’all can come back up to Montana with me. I’d set you up, all three of you. You could bring the pigs if you wanted.”

“Jensen, sometimes,” Jared snaps, sitting up straight, “you’re so dumb, I wonder how _you_ don’t drown when it rains.”

“Good thing it never rains here,” Jensen snaps back. His hands tighten on the wheel. “So I guess I’m still as well-off as you are, running towards a damn tree during a storm and aiming to kill the two things left that have any actual value in this godforsaken place.”

The truck slows and coughs to a stop. Jensen puts it in park. Sweat is running down his forehead—creating mud with the dust. He stopped wearing suits three weeks ago. There’s no way to keep clean or pretend like there’s somewhere nice to be. All he wears are shirts and denim trousers, but he never does wear the farming coveralls Jared and Frank do during chores.

Red in the face, Jensen begins to apologize. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’ta said any of that.”

In his seat, Jared crosses his arms over his chest and shakes his head. He refuses to look at Jensen. Instead, he glares out the window, relieved in some way to be gone from the children with masks. “I called you dumb,” Jared mutters. “Guess I earned it.”

They haven’t talked much since Jared picked Jensen up from Abilene. They’ve mostly worked near each other on the farm. Jared doesn’t think of it as working together; it’s not like that. It’s more like Jensen barging in on his chores and helping without thinking that Jared might have some pride left. He has dignity in what he does day in and day out, even if not another soul values it.

It’s easy for the time to pass when there are dusters every other day, with bursts of black clouds that don’t actually produce any rain. The land gets dark for different reasons. Days slide by without anyone noticing much, except another day of dust.

“You don’t sell this land,” Jared insists, his tone as hard and cold as the hail that cracked the windshield last week. “Ain’t no one buying. You live on the land. You die on the land. That’s what happens. Look at your kin. They’ll never leave. And I won’t leave them or Cole.”

“We could take Cole with us.”

“Stop talkin’, Jensen.”

“No, look, we got to talk about this. Jared, I got to get back to my job. The ranch needs me for the summer. You could help me train the new hands. I’ve seen you with the animals and a lasso. You’d have a bunk all to yourself in a real house, one with a bathroom inside and its own telephone. I’d move my Aunt and Uncle into my cabin. Nothing much would have to change, I’m tellin’ you…”

“And I’m tellin’ you!” Jared slams his fist on the dashboard. Dust shoots up. “No one is leaving with you, Jensen! _No one_. Get it through your thick head. You come in here two years too late offering to fix everythin’ and you wonder why we don’t thank you every day for it. Well you know why no one threw you a god damn parade when you came in? You made Cole feel like his life was small. You made him feel like what he was doin’ out here never was good enough. Well, it _was_ good enough. And it’s stayin’ that way until we die or the dust passes. Guess which one we bet’ll come first.”

Jensen looks away. He bites his bottom lip and closes his eyes.

“I never… I just wanted…”

“I know you wrote him because he’d get sad when he’d open your letters,” Jared mutters, hushed now. “And I know he invited you to our wedding or to come down and visit and I know that every week he asked the postman if there was something for him. You got your own way of dealin’ with what happened and we got ours. Leave it alone.”

“But _how_? Jared? How? No one told me _how_ he died. You won’t let me go visit his grave. None of y’all talk about him and when I bring him up, he’s like dust. And you’d have died if I hadn’t been there to scrape the vomit out of you after the storm.”

Jared shakes his head. Something is different. He doesn’t know what.

He’s tired and there’s dirt inside him. Every time he swallows, he tastes grit. He bruised a rib during that black blizzard; others in town were less fortunate. One of the Beverly grandmothers died in a pile of quilts, trying desperately to breathe one last breath without dust. Jensen sent the family a nickel. He don’t know them and they don’t rightly know him.

It just don’t make no sense.

After a minute, Jared mutters quietly. “Guess I would’ve.”

Another minute sweeps past and the truck starts up without choking.

 

 

 

Two days sift by.

One night, Jared can’t stop coughing.

He slumps over the kitchen table, holding his head in his hands. His ribs rattle from the persistent pierce of earth inside him. Gravel and grit mix in with his spit, mashing against his teeth. The cough does not pass no matter how much he tries to clear his throat. It does not pass when he forces himself to sit up straight in the hardback chair.

In the hour before dawn, Jared is moved.

His coughs clatter against his pillow for three hours of exhausted, dreamless sleep.

The coughing calms down.

 

On the last day of March, a decision is made.

No one can sleep in the kitchen. It is too exposed. Whatever dust seeps in past the wet rags Dora lays down in every crack, every crevice, sails in there first and lingers. It used to be flour that hung in the air. It used to be that taking a breath was no more difficult than blinking. Even blinking hurts. Their eyes are red and raw like meat.

Jared has always been wiry.

Length-wise he takes up space, but not the other way around. He doesn’t need a whole lot of room. Just the corner of a bed will do.

Because no one can stay in the kitchen longer than it takes to eat a meal, let alone to sleep in it all night. Dora makes jelly out of the hard, little green apples from the tree on their property. It ain’t much, but it tastes fine. Jared licks his spoon clean and gets up, tired from a day of shoveling sand out of the garage. Frank and Dora set on to their room. Jensen stays seated at the table, a newspaper spread out before him, the type speckled by dust.

“Don’t kick me, I won’t kick you,” Jared mumbles, placing his spoon in the sink. He walks over to his room and remains in the doorway. Over his shoulder, he adds, “Don’t be so late, neither.”

An hour later, a silhouette appears in cornflower darkness.

The mattress dips.

Sleep is easy.

 

**April 1 st, 1935**

Over chores, tales from another life continue to trickle in.

A week blows past.

Rain falls.

For the first time in weeks, it pours from the cobalt sky above them.

Fat, heavy raindrops fall onto Sweetwater and oozes into the land and its people. Jared sits outside for an hour straight. Soaked, in his black cotton shirt and roughed up denim, he tilts his head back and loses all of himself.

No one says a word to him.

He stays there, looking up at the sky, the water slick on his skin, mixing with every fine particle of dust on him. Blue. It comes down. Gray. It saturates his clothes. White. It is cold and sharp, tiny blades slicing and sluicing through the layers of grit, dirt, and sweat.

Rain mixes into a paste everywhere on him, from the cracked and scarlet nubs of his knuckles to the tender curves of his eyelids.

The scent of it is heady.

What farmer wouldn’t want rain?

Jared tilts his head forward, opening his eyes underneath the soak.

Everything is mud.

 

**April 3 rd, 1935**

Word is sent out.

The government seeks to eliminate as much cattle as possible from these lands.

Prices will hold steady for cattle they can send to canning factories; only a dollar a head will be given for those that are sick. This Sunday, any person who owns less than twenty cattle must report to the Stover’s farm.

Don’t expect meat, Dixon McCoy says when he comes through to their house with the news. The government wants to kill the cattle, not turn over the hides.

Without cows, without chickens, all that will be left are the pigs.

Jared doesn’t kick at them today.

 

 

**April 4 th, 1935**

Jensen has nearly cleared out the barn.

He has hauled and shoved dust out of there, careful of the lumber falling to pieces and rotting all around. He has worked for several days doing this, every day his once fine clothes taking on a lasting gray hue. The freckles across his face have set in a brighter color, and the crinkles around his eyes stand out a little more. Sweat pours down the slightly crooked length of his nose, sliding down past his chapped lips.

Jared runs to the house, aiming to grab fresh, wet rags for their faces.

At the kitchen window, Jared stops.

He looks in.

Frank holds Dora’s face in his large, split and cracked hands, his thumbs swiping away tears.

She coughs.

The sweep of her light, gold hair is filled with dust.

Frank runs his hand through it anyway.

 

**April 5 th, 1935**

Five cows is all they got left. It wouldn’t take more than one body to drive them into town. Their udders are covered in welts from the wind. There hasn’t been milk for breakfast this past week. It’s not that Jared can’t stand to milk them, can’t stand to wring more out of them than the land already has, but there just isn’t anything to them anymore.

He tried with one of the calmer ones. All he got was blood and dust.

Frank and Jensen are particular about going with Jared to the Stover’s.

No argument is made. If they wanna go, they can.

The horses are in no better shape than the cows; there are two of them. Jared volunteers to walk. He would prefer it, he says, tying a square of cloth over his nose and mouth. Walking would do him good.

Level with the cows, he doesn’t have to watch the ripple of their bones underneath their blistered skin.

 

The grown men of Sweetwater—hardened by dust and drought, embittered by the land they thought they knew—are crying today.

Earl White is the mayor of Sweetwater. He goes around to each man standing on the piece of the Stover’s land that has been dug up. Beside the large, cavernous ditch dug up by a machine brought in specially for this, Earl places a hand on bristling, quaking shoulders. For a moment, it looks like Dick DeSoto might clock Earl one; the presence of Dick’s nine year old boy, Willie, saves the fight for another day.

No one is taking the cows anywhere.

There is no truck, no method of transport, nothing. Cattle won’t leave Sweetwater on this day.

The government sent two men in weathered, starched suits with clipboards and hired hands—cowboys with pistols and rifles. Speech is attempted. One of the government men tries to talk over the noise. Jared can’t understand him. All he hears come out of the man’s mouth is mooing. Pained, suffering, mooing.

All cattle are lead into the ditch and shot between the eyes.

Shots are fired.

There is a break in the heave of agony.

“You can shoot them yourself or have the cowboy do it.”

“I didn’t bring ‘em for this!” Jared snaps, pushing the man’s clipboard, getting into his face. “Y’all lied! This is _shit_. How can you do this to us?! What are we sposda live on now? You’re takin’ it all away and you’re not even doin’ nothin’ with it!”

One of the cowboys takes a step forward.

A hand is held up between the cowboy and Jared. Jensen steps in.

He looks at Jared, then at the suit, quivering behind his clipboard.

“How much?” Jensen barks. When he doesn’t receive an answer, he leans down closer to the man’s beady eyes. “I said—how much? What are you paying these people for their stock?”

Two dollars a head.

That’s what their work amounts to. That’s what the lives of these cows are worth. It’s more than the money. It’s more than the cruel end. It’s all the days and nights of tending to them, naming them, respecting their lifespan and their purpose, taking them out for walks to find something sweeter and fresher to graze on. It’s raising them from the time they were calves to full-grown milkers. It’s watching all of them take their first steps—and their last.

It’s learning how to take care of them from Cole, who loved every last one of them.

Blood marinates the dirt.

Both Frank and Jensen place hands on Jared’s shoulders.

This is for the best—that’s all the suit can say. This is what has to happen so the dusters don’t come back. So grass can grow again. So people can breathe again. Ten dollars is a good amount for barely a day’s work and they’re lucky; some people got two cows at most. Ten can go a long way if they’re smart about it. And they don’t have to do nothing. The cowboys will do it.

Jared shoves the suit and walks past him. He picks up a rifle from a truck bed.

All five cows follow him.

He stands at the edge of the ditch, near the rank stench of death, and clicks his tongue for the oldest cow to come forward. She moves slowly. Her shoulder blades point out towards the sky.

What a beautiful day.

Not a cloud in the sky.

Not a duster in sight.

Marla’s ribs protrude. Her nose is covered in a layer of mud, dust, and her eyes are glossed over from hunger. She used to be… Jared raises the rifle… she used to be such a good… he can hardly stand it, why is he shaking, why can’t he steady his arms… she stumbles because her hooves hurt… there are bald patches all over her… looking so worn down… that’s how hard the wind blows and he couldn’t do any better for her or the rest…

Without words, Jensen places his hands over Jared’s on the rifle.

A tap is given.

The rifle carefully slips from Jared’s hold. He turns away from Marla, closing his eyes, pressing his forehead into Jensen’s back, against rough canvas, his jaw locked and fists clenched.

 _Crack_.

Jensen doesn’t falter.

 _Crack_.

He hardly reacts to the kickback, unmoving, firm and fixed.

Frank slaps the hide of another cow. Jared doesn’t look. He can’t. He twists his hands into Jensen’s shirt, crying bitter, dirty, cowardly tears.

Each of their five cows gets two bullets to their head.

That’s more mercy than most.

 

Bills are counted out. One dollar, two dollars, three dollars, four dollars, five dollars, six dollars, seven dollars, eight dollars, nine dollars, ten dollars total.

Earl walks over to the three of them. He mentions Cole. Jared doesn’t exactly hear in what capacity. Low, ghostly mooing never ends. DeSoto. Ackles. Noble. Brown. Travis. Lucas. Whitley. Henderson. Frantz. Smith. Johnson. Osteen. Rosales. All their stock. The ditch is filled. Hooves stick up. Black, baking blood smears around the edge. While Earl is making his chins move, Harry Morton is begging one of the cowboys to spare a calf, let him have it for food for their table if this is the end.

With the butt of the rifle, the calf is knocked out. Its tongue rolls out of his mouth. Harry loses it.

Jensen places an arm around Jared’s shoulders. Carefully, he turns them away from the pit and the horrified scream of a desperate, starving man mourning what might as well be a child to him. This is all they’ve got.

Frank punches Earl. No one rushes forward to help him. Not even the cowboys. This time, Jared rides with Jensen, slumped forward.

Coughing and choking the entire ride back, Jared covers his ears.

He can’t stand the sound of guns and mooing.

 

Clouds gather midday.

Jared swears.

They look red.

 

**April 6 th, 1935**

There is a duster, around noon. It keeps them inside until it passes.

Aside from the holler and hiss of wind, and the scratch of dust against the wood, there is not a sound in the house. Frank sleeps. Dora mends some of Jared’s shirts. There isn’t anything to do until the dust stops.

At the table, Jensen has a newspaper out.

He was reading train schedules until Jared sits down next to him. Jensen looks up, gives a nod, and turns the page to something different—an article about the theatre in Abilene. Its owners were boarding up the place, Jensen explains, pointing at the grainy picture, until a section of townsfolk demanded they stay open. All they have are the pictures on screen. A committee was selected to help keep the theatre open.

“No wonder why they’re fightin’ so much for the theatre. Folks can’t always read or write,” Jensen says in a rumble, smoothing out the paper, “but they can always watch a matinee.”

Jared stretches out and taps the little pig with the tip of his boot. The pig grunts and ignores Jared, comfortable in its sleep, blessedly unaware of the duster outside.

“I can’t,” Jared mumbles. “Never learnt.”

Jensen’s chair creaks as he moves in it. He places one leg over the other, then sits back, and looks over at Jared. Like it’s anything as ordinary as dust mixed into biscuits, Jensen slides the paper into his lap and points at the top of the page, right above the picture of the theatre.

“This says ‘Palace.’ P-a-l-a-c-e.”

Dora looks up from her mending. Jared catches her eye. She gives the slightest nod.

Outside, dust stifles everything.

“P-a-l-a-c-e.”

“Right. This is here is theater. ‘T-h-e-a-t-r-e.’”

“T-h-e-a-t-r-e?”

“Yep.”

“Do another.”

“All right.”

A page is turned.

 

**Midnight**

“Jensen.”

“…huh?”

“Wake up.”

“I’m up, I’m up. What’s wrong?”

“Get dressed.”

“Jared… what time… what’s goin’ on now?”

“Quit talkin’ and get outta bed.”

“You’re crazy. This is crazy. Where… you seen my boots?”

“Under the bed.”

“Don’t put ‘em there. I like havin’ ‘em on hand.”

“You also like tripping over ‘em in the morning. I hear you.”

“…you couldn’t possibly hear me.”

“I’m a light sleeper.”

“Well… don’t put my boots there.”

“Are you done?”

“Yeah.”

“Why’ve you stayed this long, Jensen?”

“Why am I up at this hour, Jared?”

“Answer mine first.”

“Why should I.”

“Because I said so.”

“Because you said so?”

“Jensen, don’t be stupid.”

“I’m not stupid.”

“…I know. I know you ain’t.”

“Jared.”

“Hmm.”

“I just wanted to help. I wanted to see y’all set up right.”

“No one’s leaving.”

“I know.”

“You got to leave.”

“Soon, yes.”

“…will you visit again?”

“Do you want me to?”

“I… yeah. Yeah.”

“Okay. I’ll see what I can do.”

 “All right.”

“You could… come up and visit me. I’d have a place for you.”

“Never been to Montana. Never been that far up North.”

“Well, that’s what makes it fun, right?”

“Is there grass?”

“Yes. It started to grow back last year, ‘round this time.”

“Do you think… it’ll come back here?”

“Jared.”

“What?”

“What are we doin’?”

Jared steps out of the room, into the kitchen and towards the back door. The pigs are curled up together underneath the kitchen table. They are not to go out.

“Come on.”

The door is held open.

Jensen follows.

 

The only gems in Sweetwater are in the sky.

At midnight, sapphires are laid out as far as the eye can see.

It was Jared’s right as Cole’s husband to pick the plot out. He chose this square of land, which used to be covered in emerald grass.

This is what Jared knows now.

There is no more grass. There is no more top soil. The sod shouldn’t have been turned and it never did rain enough for the land to be used this way. But even now, most of the farmers in Sweetwater ain’t thinking that way. They’re thinking of all the things they could try harder. Not even new things—the same old things, just… a little harder. Maybe, if they plowed deeper, or maybe, if they want things bad enough, the land would turn again.

That’s how farmers think.

It’s how Cole thought.

A bucket of gems wouldn’t go very far here in Sweetwater. Sure, there’d be cash. But that’s not rain. That’s not grass. That’s not a break in the drought for desperate men and women looking up to the sky and at their land and wondering—why. That’s not the way things used to be. The land here and these people will never be the same as they used to be. Sapphires and emeralds are better off in the sky, unattainable but pretty at a distance. Gems are and will always be here.

At the foot of Cole’s grave.

“Listen,” Jared says, above a whisper, “I brought you someone special, sugar.”

Here they are the three of them, underneath a sapphire sky.

A sprout of grass sticks out from near the wooden cross. It could be gold.

 

**April 7 th, 1935**

Cole listens to everything Jensen has to say. He listens patiently. There are stories about Chicago, about Pittsburgh, about New York, and, of course, Montana. The country is different out there. It’s nearly Canada. Right now, the dust out there doesn’t push and pinch into every open space; all the hands on the ranch are practicing crop rotation. Diversify what’s in the soil. Give new things a chance to grow and see what might stick. It’s all being tested while the tourists come in like turkeys and pretend to live in the Wild West.

Cole listens to the apology.

He listens to any and all words that tumble out of Jensen until they aren’t words anymore—they are rough, hushed cries.

This morning, Jensen listens, his throat dry from all his talking.

He listens to Jared in the stillness of the bed they share. He listens until Jared finishes, until he wraps an arm around Jared and pulls him close. Jensen listens until they both hurt.

 

It was a cattle drive.

Just to move a herd of sixty from one edge of the Stover’s property to the other so they could find something—anything—to graze on. The Stovers would pay them ten dollars each for a day’s work tending to their stock. More and more animals throughout Sweetwater were reported missing, or worse, found tangled up in barbed wire miles away from their owners’ properties. The dust spooked them. The dust confused them. And the cattle especially, they were so hungry, they just became restless with their desperation.

Jared lies on his side, facing away from Jensen in bed.

The job was simple. Move this herd out to a wedge of property that might have some Russian thistle to graze on. It would take a few hours at most, and they were planning on being back by suppertime.

With two of the Stover boys, Jared and Cole rode out. By Cole’s count, there were fifty-two cows to be moved. A formation was crafted under Cole’s direction; he was the most senior man amongst them.

A duster appeared on the horizon. It came without a lick of warning, without a hint of its formation, and without any mercy.

The sun was blacked out.

Panic swept through their party and the cattle. Cole shouted out to turn south—away from the duster and towards the barn. But the cattle were beyond following orders and the dust was too thick. One of the boys was clawing at his eyes, screaming that he couldn’t see, he just couldn’t see. This was before dusters were common. Being caught in one felt like a million cacti needles scraping against every surface of flesh.

South, Cole hollered, head south!

Jared managed to turn his horse, but he could not see more than two feet in front of him until the duster let up for a few seconds. It was just enough of a window for Jared to notice that Cole was not on his horse. Cole was nowhere.

Both things were deafening in that moment—the sound of his own voice screeching for Cole and the rush of wind pummeling dust into their lungs, eyes, ears, and mouths.

Cole was trampled.

When the dirt settled and the duster passed, Jared was the one to retrieve his body.

There are hard things in life.

And then there’re things like that.

Things that only happen out in No Man’s Land.

 

After they’ve worked in the barn for most of the day, Jared sits on the back step with one of Jensen’s old newspapers. He skips the advertisements for supplies and clothing, and all the junk pictures of different homes and farms for sale throughout Texas.

Instead, he seeks out an article, intrigued by a picture of a man holding a baby. The article talks about a doctor in Cimarron County, who felt that money was, “an impossibility.” That’s a difficult word. Jared struggles with it. He never formally learned, but he knows bits and pieces of things that he’s used over the years. He did know the word ‘doctor’ and ‘eat’ and ‘dime.’ All of these words are used in this article.

This doctor shot himself in the head; in a grave he dug himself, to spare anyone the mess. There was nothing more for him—he had no more to eat, no more to drink, and left behind a single dime to his wife and nine children.

Set down on the step beside him, Jensen helps him make out the word ‘impossibility’ and ‘financial’ and ‘suicide.’

Then Jensen points to an article he thinks Jared might like.

It’s about a new film playing at the Palace. Just two cents a seat.

While Jared works through this new article, Jensen scrubs at his face, coughs, and runs a hand through his tawny hair. Dust falls from him. Jared reaches over; he swats away a patch of dust from Jensen’s shoulders.

Green eyes meet his.

Jared looks away first, his cheeks flushed.

“Tell me what this word is,” he demands, though his voice isn’t as biting as he thought it would be.

“That’s ‘malaise,’” Jensen murmurs, “it sorta means… sad. M-a-l-a-i-s-e.” Jensen knocks his knee against Jared’s. But he doesn’t move after that. Their knees stay touching; only a fine layer of dust and dirt sticks in between them. Jared breathes in the filthy, scratchy air, exhaling filthy, scratchy air right back out. He holds onto the paper. Jensen extends his right hand and brushes off the dust from Jared’s knee. One, two, three swipes of his hand sends it all flying away from them, out on its way to Oklahoma, or to New Mexico, or to Kansas, or perhaps even further north than that.

Of course, more dust takes its place. The wind sees to that within a few seconds. Black clouds on the horizon and an orange sky this morning are not good signs. There’ll be another duster today. Later. Jared gives it about an hour before it hits their plot.

Jensen keeps his hand over Jared’s knee. Dust sweeps onto the freckles across Jensen’s knuckles.

When they get up and Jensen takes his hand off, the space where it was is the cleanest part of Jared.

There might be something to that.

And Jared knows it’s not malaise.

 

**April 10 th, 1935**

Outside the mayor’s office in town, the Red Cross sets up a tent.

Three trucks drive in. A handful of young nurses, escorted by government officials, step out with masks on. They begin distributing supplies to whomever stops by, and before long, there is a line that stretches the entire street. Jared walks over from Preacher’s and stands in that line for forty-five minutes, coughing and wheezing into the collar of his shirt. Jensen is making a phone call to Montana.

Most folks are given one cardboard box of supplies that contain cans of meat and vegetables, bandages, a loaf of bread, a sack of flour, and things that were supposed to take the place of a doctor.

This is the government’s relief.

Jared wonders how many of their cattle are in these cans. A year ago he’d have had too much pride to stand in this line. But there is no other way. And that rings true for most of Sweetwater. There are no more chickens, no more cattle.

Children are set aside inside the tent to see an army doctor. This is temporary. Whatever the man can patch up or soothe within two minutes is it. Some adults try to squeeze their way into the doctor’s sights; they try to stick around and listen to some of the advice given so that they too can try it. Drops of kerosene are mixed into sugar to stop some of the coughing. Children who are in worse shape are told to sit in one of the covered truck beds and wait. Jared moves through the line, accepting a box, turning away from masked nurses.

Practically all of Sweetwater turns out for the Red Cross trucks.

Back at Preacher’s, Jensen is at the bar, speaking to the man himself. Their conversation stops as soon as Jared is within two steps. Preacher sets to scraping dust off the counter. Jared places the box on a clean section.

With everyone in line for the Red Cross, the saloon is empty, save for old John Brown, who hasn’t moved since the bank took his plot of land. They said they’d do it. And they did. The sheriff had to drive him off it. What was left of his savings and the cash he got from his own cattle being shot and buried has been put towards whiskey and a rented room in town. Slumped in the corner, John Brown looks outside; his eyes are filmy and vacant.

“I see the two of you been gettin’ along fine as rain,” Preacher mentions, sliding over a shot of whiskey to Jared. “None of you killed each other yet, that’s good.”

“Rusty with my gun, that’s all,” Jared quips. He clears his throat and takes his shot, knocking it back with ease, bristling only when the dirt in his mouth mixes with it. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and sits on the bar stool next to Jensen. “You want another?”

Preacher places a new shot glass on the counter. “Course he does. This here is the best medicine.”

Reaching for his pocket, Jensen shrugs. “Well, I guess so.”

“Then I want another too.” A nickel is laid down and pushed over to Preacher. “Two, please.”

Just as Preacher is about to make a comment—because Jared _knows_ there is commenting to be had—the saloon doors swing open. Folks with and without boxes file in, fill up tables, and start talking loudly to each other about the President and his canned relief. Jim Nobel grumbles that if they could just can each other up, they might be able to send themselves out to California. Ted Baker disagrees; there’s no use in going to California. The Archers left for those parts and they’ve sent word that there are no jobs. They can’t find work, they can’t keep fed, they can’t do anything different than what they were already doing here.

Two shots of whiskey are poured for Jared and Jensen, and then Preacher leaves them to tend to the sudden demand throughout the saloon. A few women are here too, sidling up to the counter. These are not women from town. They are painted and primed and perfumed with something that smells worse than burning thistles.

But they keep their distance.

That’s all that matters.

“I read something in the paper today,” Jensen murmurs lowly, turned towards Jared. “Somethin’ troubling, Jared.”

Neither of their new shots is touched. “What’s that about?”

A glance is made at the two ladies. Jensen leans a little closer. “Three people been killed in Mariposa since last month. Sherriff there found the bodies swinging from barns.”

“Lot of people do that.”

“Not that,” Jensen clarifies. “This is different. There’s no support or box or anythin’ like that underneath when they find the bodies hanging. All their faces are slashed, too, from ear to ear.”

“They put that much in the paper?”

“No. I called Mariposa.”

“Jensen. Mariposa’s far.”

“But it’s not _that_ far.”

“Fine,” Jared breathes out, tipping his hat back an inch. “So what? You know twenty people died in Abilene last month. Most of them babies.”

A frown pulls at Jensen’s mouth. He shakes his head and brings his shot of whiskey closer to him. “That’s not… it’s not the same. Someone is doing this. Amarillo seen the same thing two months ago, faces cut, bodies hung, everything. I’m a ranger, Jared, I know what to look for. All these people are the same in one way.”

“What way?”

Jensen takes his shot. He sets down the empty glass and stares at the counter. His voice is thick with whiskey and dust. “They’re all young, good looking men, all of ‘em about twenty years old. Look, I’m not sayin’ I know everything, but you got to at least admit that there’s something here. And it’s something you ought to be concerned about.”

Before Jared can retort that he can take care of himself and others just fine—and he’s never ever without a pistol—one of the local men taps Jensen on the shoulder.  

In two seconds, Jensen has looked Amos Folkers over and come to a decision, expressed by the simple words, “Move along.”

Not to be put out, Amos puts his arm down on the counter and leans forward. The smell of him hangs thicker in the air than the dust. The Folkers were the first to lose their land, back in ’33. Charles Folkers, the patriarch of the family, had a heart attack on New Year’s Day of 1934. It was too much, Dora had said about his death. In the middle of ’32, he took out a mortgage against the farm he already owned. He was convinced that the drought would not hold past ’33 and that he would one day be able to leave his five sons a square mile of land each. Amos and his family now live in a shanty just outside of town.

“Say, pal, don’t they got better lookin’ hens where you come from?” Amos slurs, his face streaked with red dirt and gray grime. “You’se pickin’ on the wrong one. That’s all bone and hair that one.”

There’s the nod towards Jared and Jared clenches his fists. He’s about to take Amos Folkers down—sad story or not. They’ve all got sad stories. Every single person in Sweetwater has some tale to tell of better days and how things used to be. But Jared won’t take sass from someone like Amos Folkers, who lets his mother and sisters scrounge for food while he brings pennies to Preacher’s and drinks himself stupider than he already is.

“Shut your trap, Amos,” Jared hisses and stands. “Get back to your hole.”

Amos smiles, his tongue peeking out, and his eyes slime their way up the length of Jared’s body. Leering, he laughs, the breath of it rattling and wheezing from a deep dust hack. “I guess,” he mutters, a hand over his groin, “you do got some meat on you from this angle. Did you have him already, fella?” Jensen’s arm is nudged. “Did you put your dick where your cousin did, too?”

Time is not given for Jensen to react.

Jared rushes Amos. He places his hands on Amos’ chest and pushes, knocking over tables and drinks and whatever is in their way until they’re out on the street. Amos keeps laughing—shrieking with amusement. It’s so funny. Hawhawhawhawhaw. Cole’s cousin come into town and the first hen he wants to fuck is Cole’s sorry, sad widow. Hawhawhawhawhaw. Don’t think nobody else ain’t thought the same thing—everyone’s talking about it, everyone! Hawhawhawhawhaw! And everyone _knows_ Jared is a cheap piece of ass that came in like a tumbleweed and latched himself onto the first man who gave him a kind word and a shot of something strong, but not as strong as Amos could, that’s for sure! HAWHAWHAWHAW.

Patrons from Preacher’s spill out onto the street, Jensen and Preacher shoving past them.

Jared keeps his pistol on a holster. His hand hovers over it as Amos lies in the dirt, hollering until he’s red.

Pistol’s easy.

The Colt is a quick draw. One bullet to the gut—that’s all the likes of Amos Folkers would deserve for his time on this earth. It’s more mercy than Cole got. Than the Beverly grandmother got. Than the thousands of rabbits clubbed to the heads got. Than Amos’ own flesh and blood ever got.

But the pistol’s not enough.

From his vest, Jared takes out something better.

“Say it again!” Jared shouts, bending down and fisting a handful of Amos’ greasy hair. “Say his name one more time—I fucking dare you.”

Pushed against Amos’ nose with his free hand, Jared holds a bullwhip.

Amos grits his teeth and spits at Jared. He struggles against the hand in his hair, bucking, and his raw, burnt mouth spewing curses on top of the shrill, echoing laughter.

“HAWHAWHA—“

This is not Jared’s stock. These are not the eyes of a cow that would follow him to the edge of annihilation.

His arm is steady. His aim is exact—precise.

Three steps away from Amos, Jared stands with his feet apart, his right arm extends back. The bullwhip draws out, unfurling to its full length. Every motion is fluid and practiced. He feels the line of his body stretch. Dust presses into his collar and nags at his eyes, but he could do this blindfolded—he has done this blindfolded.

Left arm forward, Jared rotates, pitching forward, the whip sailing and the end of it cracking, thunderous and final.

 _Crack_.

The bullwhip snaps an inch away from Amos Folker’s nose. Bawling, Amos tries to crawl away. Jared retracts the whip and lifts his arm once more. He tips his hat down a fraction and makes adjustments for the change in wind, the pickup, the uplift...

Wait.

“Duster!” someone from the crowd wails. “There’s a duster comin’!”

A hand is placed over Jared’s on the handle of the whip. As Amos Folkers creeps and slithers away on his belly, crying and sniveling, Jensen keeps his grip firm and his voice clear above the oncoming storm.

“Let’s go.”

 

As Jared grabs the box from the bar, Preacher stops him for a moment.

Out on the empty street, Jensen fights with the truck. The engine chokes in a nasty, grinding way, too full of dirt to turn.

“He’s fixin’ to leave soon, isn’t he?” Preacher asks, meeting Jared’s eyes.

Hands are firm on the box. This has to get them through at least a month. There’s work out near Abilene that Jared might be able to get, and if he’s lucky, he’ll be promoted to foreman within another month after. The government’s paying able-bodied men three dollars a day to dig ditches or build roads. It’s proper work; not a hand out. No one in Sweetwater has work anymore, because they can’t afford to pay.

“He bought his ticket,” Jared murmurs, looking away. “I ain’t stoppin’ him.”

“Tickets can be refunded if you talk to Jerry nice enough. What are you doin’, Jared? Do you know? Do you have any idea?”

“I…”

“That boy deserved what he got from you—and a whole lot worse,” Preacher continues. “But you mean to tell me that you wanna stay here with the likes of Amos Folkers for company?” Preacher presses. “We are gettin’ deeper and deeper in dust. I know you don’t think like most here—it ain’t gonna get better this year and maybe not even next. So, I’mma ask you again: what are you doing?”

Old John Brown is still in his corner. He’s safer in here than anywhere else. The Red Cross will be opening up a makeshift hospital in the empty fabric store. Children and the elderly are to be tended to first. Boys from the Hernandez family are helping out to put it together and gather wooden boards.

That’s how bad Sweetwater is.

This land of haze.

Jared doesn’t answer Preacher.

 

**April 11 th, 1935**

The ticket is for the twenty-first. This train will leave from Abilene, where it will connect to a bigger train in Amarillo and head up north after that. Folks in Montana have been told to expect Jensen by the end of the month, if the dust doesn’t delay the train along the way.

“I hope to have the barn clear by then,” Jensen says, tying the laces of his boots as he sits on the edge of the bed. “I don’t want word to reach me that you tried tending to it by yourself. Ask Preacher to come help you. He’d do it if you asked.”

This morning, Frank and Dora left early, at first light. The Red Cross has put a call out for volunteers and Dora said she was tired of sitting at home cleaning dust. It always comes back. Always. There is nothing that can be done to keep it out. Her broom does nothing after a duster; Jared has set out a small shovel for her to use instead. But a shovel don’t do much for the curtains, the plates, the cups, their clothes, or their skin.

With her, she took the last jar of crabapple jelly. That is their contribution for the sick.

Jared’s eyes rest on the broad plane of Jensen’s shoulders.

“Maybe you come back in August.” Jared kicks at the air near the pigs at his feet. They’ve been squealing all morning; Jared isn’t sure from what. Pig business, he supposes.

Over his shoulder, Jensen looks at Jared. “That’s peak season for me still, Jared.”

“October, then.”

“No.” Jensen stands. “That’s practically winter. I wouldn’t be able to get back up there after.”

“When then?” Jared snaps, leaning against the doorway. “You’re gonna leave and jus’ never come back, is that it?”

“Easy. Don’t jump so fast I can’t catch you.”

“I’m not askin’ for you to catch me.”

“It’s an expression.”

“…I know that.”

“I don’t make promises I can’t keep,” Jensen says, his hands on Jared’s shoulders. “I’m never gonna tell you the sky is blue when I can see orange. If I came out again, it’d be around this time next year.” A squeeze is given. “I want things, Jared. I want things my own way, don’t wanna be living on Jeff’s land forever. I don’t want to farm, but I do want to settle. Get me a cabin on good land. Get some horses, some cattle, and some no good pigs to kick around.”

Dust snakes into the hitch of Jared’s breath.

“I want a good day’s work and a long night by a fire. I want… a family of my own. Little ones I can tell stories about their Uncle Cole to. Maybe see if I can get ‘em to be turkey kids, too.”

Useless tears burn with the dust around Jared’s eyes.

That all sounds so good.

So damn good.

“I don’t ever want to forget him.” Jared’s voice sounds like wind to him.

A nod is given.

If it rains…

If it rains…

If it…

“I’m not him, Jared. But I would never want anyone to forget him, neither. I’m sorry I wasn’t here for so long. And I’m sorry you been carrying this all by yourself. You done a fine job.”

A farmer’s world depends on the word ‘if.’

Jensen is not a farmer.

Jared understands that and just a little more.

He presses a kiss to Jensen’s mouth—eyes wide open.

 

Water is pumped from the well and lugged inside.

Just a bucket.

Jensen covers it with his cleanest cotton shirt, tucking the sleeves of it under the bucket and setting it beside the bed.

This is not water to bathe in. Jared wonders what it’s for but doesn’t ask questions. He lies in bed, undressed, watching Jensen. He watches the curves of firm muscle, the appearance of brown, rough skin underneath his shirt and belt. Rolling onto his stomach, Jared fixes his eyes in between strong thighs, freckles present all the way to the thick, heavy base of Jensen’s cock.

A hand reaches down and cards through Jared’s hair.

The bed creaks as Jensen climbs onto it.

His jaw thumbed over, Jared’s cheek is kissed.

They kiss, plastered together by sweat and dust and dirt, pushing against each other with rumbling appetite, like thunder out on the horizon. Jared listens to the hands against him—hands that stroke him, memorize the sharp angles of his hip bones, hands that reach behind and cup the swell of his ass until the skin there is red. He listens to these fingers press and test and search for whatever makes Jared’s breath pick up and noises escape the back of his throat.

The slick of spit and sweat is louder than the snake and slither of dust on the roof.

As more paint peels off the house, Jensen sits against the headboard, Jared in his lap. He holds Jared by the hips and looks up, green eyes as clear as the grass must be in the memories of all those old timers.

These eyes are the only green things left in Sweetwater.

And they are focused on Jared, looking at him like he is new, like he is clean, like he isn’t filled with dust and gunk and hurt.

Lined up, Jensen pushes in, bearing Jared down.

His hands never leave Jared. They pull them closer, trailing up Jared’s back, squeezing Jared’s ass hard enough for Jared to let out a small yip followed by a low moan. Pounding up, buried deep, Jensen fucks into Jared rough and hard.

The drag and burn of it is chased by a wave of pure, unfiltered pleasure.

Jared arches over Jensen, his hair tumbling over to form a curtain of sorts, and he fuses their mouths together. They breathe dust and moans into the other. That don’t matter. A twist and swivel of Jensen’s hips—that matters. Jared works himself down faster, chasing the rhythm Jensen has set, matching it, then pushing him to double it. He keeps his hands on the walls for balance, then stops his movements to bask in a minute of solid, uninhibited thrusting.

He is worked out—an orgasm wrung from him that increases the pressure and heat over Jensen’s cock. Jared shouts, tossing his head back, coming in ropes between the both of them. He feels every twitch and swell of Jensen inside him, sure as he has ever felt the first relief of rain. Jensen muffles his own cry into Jared’s shoulder, shuddering, enveloped tight and deep as he fills Jared up.

In the first few moments after, Jared starts to cough from the activity. He slumps against Jensen, clearing his throat, trying to catch his breath. He’s too afraid to look at the mess between them, fearing that he might find dust there.

Another kiss finds its way onto Jared’s forehead, against the stubborn waves of hair there.

Jensen moves slightly to the right, reaching out for the bucket. He dips his hand in.

A handful of water is pressed to Jared’s mouth. Jared coughs, drinks, and coughs some more. Handfuls of water from the bucket are given until Jared can finally breath without much wheezing.

That’s what the water was for.

 

They have sex two more times after.

By the end of it all, Jared is draped over Jensen, boneless and sticky.

It’ll be sunset soon. Frank and Dora should be home before dark. They’ve got to clean up before then and pull more water from the well for baths.

The wind stops for a few minutes.

Jensen’s rumble fills Jared’s senses.

“Tell me somethin’ you haven’t told a soul.” Jensen noses Jared’s cheek.

Scrunching his nose, Jared frowns. “Why?”

“Don’t ask why, Jared. Go on. Tell.”

“You wanna be sad and put out?”

“Would you quit arguin’?”

“All right, all right. Sleep with a man once and he’s already making demands, “ Jared huffs.

Jensen swats his ass.

 

Dallas was Jared’s first stop. He had heard good things about Dallas, so he made his way south on a few trains, dodging conductors and hungry men every fifty miles or so. He was robbed once, while he slept, but all the perpetrator took was an old biscuit Jared had on him since he left St. Louis.

That’s all he walked out with—five biscuits and a goodbye.

Losing one wasn’t so bad.

Arriving in Dallas was. He’d never been a farmhand before. When his father was working, Jared would often go with him to the canning factory and clean the floors for the men, getting a couple of pennies for his trouble from the foreman. That was work he knew. None of that work was given to him in Dallas. Life was difficult there. It was too large of a city, too big of a place, too much of the unknown to swallow at once. Jared slept under bridges and benches until he heard about Abilene. It was further into Texas than Jared wanted to go, but it was that or follow a train to Austin. Abilene, at least, he’d heard was smaller and folks were kinder. A man willing to work could make fifty cents a day doing odd jobs for the families there.

Miles and miles of flat, beige land passed by as Jared rode in the back of a pickup. The trains were not an option out of Dallas after all; guards were posted on all sides of the station and the conductors had help in sorting out who had a ticket and who did not. Jared traded what he had for a ride to Abilene. The trade took place in that truck. Jared lay flat on his back and covered his face with his shirt. It was important not to cry. Never cry. Never.

Pa died on Jared’s fifteenth birthday. He just fell over at the factory. Someone said he clogged the line for a good thirty minutes before anyone was able to heft his body out of the canning machine.

It never struck Jared as odd that he would end up like his mother—a young widow.

These things just happen, someone from their block said to her, it’s all part of God’s plan.

God’s plan, it turned out, was for the family to be out on the streets when they couldn’t make the rent. God’s plan was for Jared’s brothers and sisters to go hungry day in and day out and to have complete strangers on the street call them urchins and unwanted gutter trash. It was God’s plan for the scarcity of work and for Jared’s eldest brother to run off without word, never to be seen or heard from again. Yes, all of that was God’s plan.

Jared tried to support them.

Ma died giving birth to their new siblings. The babies died with her.

One by one, Jared watched his brothers and sisters led away with the police, placed into cars that would take them to foster homes or orphanages where they would become wards of the state. Jared would have gone with them. He would have tried real hard to make an honest living wherever he was put, if only to check on everyone. But the system, a police officer said, was meant for little ones. At almost sixteen, he could fend for himself. He was a man and men take care of themselves.

Dallas seemed far, far away and so much unlike St. Louis.

What was left of his family was scattered. One of his sisters was here, one was there, and two of his brothers were there. Over the years, Jared’s letters went astray or were mailed back: return to sender. Eventually, he lost track of them all.

Abilene didn’t work out.

But the man who drove him there said he knew a grocer in Sweetwater that was looking for a hand. He could get a ride to Sweetwater. For a price.

Early sightings of Jared vary from resident to resident. The most consistent story tells that Jared walked into town, having come from nowhere and nothing.

Someone found that truck on the side of the road a week later.

Jared was sixteen.

 

**Midnight**

“You got a porch like this in Montana?”

“Sure do. Though, the company out there isn’t half as fine.”

“Jensen.”

“What?”

“…I was gonna tell you not to be such a turkey’d old fool. But now…”

“Oh? Now?”

“If I… if I ever want to go there…”

“You just call me and I’ll send for you. See if you can drag my Uncle and Aunt out there too.”

“Okay. Yeah.”

“He wrote to me about you, you know. The way he talked about you in his letters—I was sure you were made out of solid gold.”

“Heh. Seems like Cole, I spose.”

“Well, he always had a… grand way of writin’ about things, especially this place, but nah, you stood out. Hell, I was half in love with you just the way he described you and everything you did for them.”

“Did you plan this?”

“No. Not at all.”

“Good.”

“I didn’t hardly expect to… I would never…”

“I know.”

“Okay.”

“It’s your turn.”

“For?”

“Tell me something no one else knows. Not a soul.”

“Damn.”

“You got another year to see me next—make it good.”

“Does a horse count as another soul?”

“Can the horse talk?”

“Not to other people.”

“Get serious.”

“I am serious!”

“So tell me!”

“You don’t quit, do you? All right. Well. I can sing.”

“Prove it.”

“I jus’ had to tell you, you said nothin’ about doing it.”

“Please.”

“…that ain’t fair.”

“…”

“Christ, all right. It’s not right though. I don’t have my guitar. You’re not allowed to judge, do you hear me? I don’t want you tellin’ Preacher all about this.”

“Just sing, Jensen.”

Hard-pan land is all around them. How long it’ll look this way, no one can tell. Not the President, not the science men, not even the farmers who swear it’ll just take a few good rains for the soil to improve. The land will turn when and if it wants. It’s land. No one controls it.

What might make it prettier would be the sounds of Jensen’s guitar.

Music is tough to come by out here. They never had money for a radio. Preacher doesn’t have many folks pass through anymore, not since the dusters stormed through on the daily. Folks from the East heading West avoided stopping if they could. And by now, anyone with an instrument to play has sold it. There’s no use in having a piano in the parlor when children are starving. Jo, a local girl, used to play the hottest piano anyone in Sweetwater had ever heard. But she couldn’t live on applause or well-wishes. Out to Abilene she left, seeking an audience that might toss pennies or dimes instead.

But this is a good start—nothing but Jensen’s voice and the distant whip of the wind.

Jared has to close his eyes. He has to sink into the dip of Jensen’s voice, rich and profound and sultry. Dust does not get into the sound of it. Dust does not hinder the expression, the timbre, the depth. The melody of the song is slow. Jensen takes his time.

“There comes a time, a time in everyone’s life, where nothin’ seems to go your way. Where nothin’ seems to turn out right.”

A year seems too long.

“There may come a time you just can’t seem to find your place. That’s when you need someone, someone that you can call. And when your faith is gone, it feels like you can’t go on.”

Much too long to wait to rest his head against this shoulder.

“Let it be me. Let it be me. If it’s a friend that you need. Let it be me.”

They’ve just gotten started.

“Now I remember all too well, just how it feels to be all alone. To feel like you’d give anything for just a little place you can call your own. That’s when you need someone, someone that you can call.”Jared’s hand is held and squeezed. “When your faith is all gone, and it feels like you can’t go on. Let it be me. If it’s a friend that you need. Let it be me.”

This is the shortest distance between them.

Jensen’s voice settles across the land.

Jared hopes it is carried as far as the dust is.

Everyone should have this.

Even if they don’t get it for very long.

 

**April 12 th, 1935**

No rain.

Three dusters in one day.

The pigs get out once and Jared cusses them from here to Amarillo, threatening to make them into pork loin and bacon. He forces the little one into the sink and cleans mud out of its snout and ears. Damn pigs. Damn walking pieces of bacon. The big one becomes jealous of the attention and runs to Jensen, who is attempting to read the paper. Being bigger, the pig on the ground doesn’t have as well of a sense of balance. It trips over Dora’s feet and causes a commotion all on its own.

At bed time, Jared smells like dust, brush, and pig.

Jensen don’t care.

He keeps an arm around Jared.

 

**April 13 th, 1935**

Saturday night is bath time.

Frank is the first to have a bath, followed by Dora. For her bath, everyone gives her the utmost privacy, and Jared scoops out as much dust from Frank’s bath before.

Next up, is Jensen, because he is a guest and Jared is feeling generous. Jensen tries to give his turn up. Jared won’t have it. A sly, hushed suggestion is made from dangerous lips for Jared to get in and join, but Jared swats at the water and sits at the kitchen table. There’s no way the two of them will fit in the basin at the same time. Jensen contents himself with pulling Jared in for wet, slippery kisses whether it’s his turn or not.

For ten minutes—Jared counts—he is almost free of dust.

 

At seven, Jensen wants to head out to visit Cole.

He’s got a few more stories to tell before he leaves.

Both pigs follow Jensen; he stands by the back door, waiting on Jared to finish lacing up his shoes so they can go. They’ll take the brown mare out there. If the threat of another duster weren’t so real, they could walk it. But the lack of wind doesn’t guarantee their safety and Jared figures it’s best not to tempt nature.

Jensen made their bed today. He does it almost military style—so smooth and precise.

As Jared finishes with his shoes, he looks up at the sound of Dora clearing her throat.

“Jared?” Dressed in her nightgown, she leans against the doorway. Her hair hangs over her shoulder in one, long braid.

“Yes ma’am?” He stuffs his pistol into its holster over his right hip.

“Can I speak with you for a moment? I know you’re fixing to go out.”

From the kitchen, Jensen mentions that he’ll give them some privacy and he’ll be outside with the mare. The sound of his boots is heavy against the floorboards. On his way out, he takes the tub of water Jared used. Jared calls after him to pour some of the water onto the pigs and let them dry off in the barn. Neither pig has any trouble following Jensen when he whistles for them. They trot off, Jared a thing of the past. Jared and Dora move into the kitchen as Jensen exits. The screen door rattles shut.

Dora doesn’t stand to Jared’s shoulders. She has always felt so small to him, like a bird.

“Where y’all goin’, Jared?”

“To visit Cole, ma’am.”

“Take a mask with you.”

“Oh, no… it’s alright.”

“Take it.” They only have one mask for the house. That’s all they could get from the Red Cross and they were lucky for it. Some folks got none at all; the nurses ran out. A shipment from Abilene was going to come through soon they said. From its place on a hook, Dora takes it and hands it over to Jared. “Sometimes, you’re so busy takin’ care of us, I forget how young you are.” Her voice is soft, but there’s a watery quality to it that has Jared on a bit of an edge. “Tell me you’ll have a good time with Jensen.”

If he closed his eyes right now, he could almost hear Cole. Just a few touches lower and it would match.

“I will, ma’am.”

She untangles her braid, allowing it to fall loose. “It hurts so much to look at my nephew, sometimes I can’t hardly stand it. But then… I remember Cole talking to me about him—momma, Jensen did this, momma Jensen did that, momma, Jensen didn’t get in trouble why did I?” Her hands wring a portion of her nightgown. “Go on. Don’t listen to me. Don’t let me keep you.”

In some way, Jared might always think a little this way—what if. What if Cole hadn’t died? What if they hadn’t turned over the sod and demanded more from this land than they had any right to? What if folks hadn’t settled in this part of the country at all? What if one day, it no longer hurts to think about Cole? What if… one day, he wears another man’s ring again? And what if that man is standing outside, snapping at the pigs to stop rolling around in the mud and get into the coop?

What if.

What if it rains soon?

Jared takes Dora’s hands and gives a squeeze. He then turns and opens the back door to leave.

Standing in the dim light of the lantern on the kitchen table, Dora speaks once more.

“You go out with him, Jared. Don’t keep him waiting any longer.”

 

**April 14 th, 1935**

**Noon**

The people of Sweetwater are happy.

Today has been clear and pristine, with winds that don’t carry with them a streak of violence or harm. Mothers and housewives in town have the windows open, airing out their dirt-cave dwellings and beating the dust out of everything they still own. Carpets and curtains are hung outside without fear. Brooms and shovels work hard.

Back at home, Dora and Frank are doing the same.

Dirt belongs under feet, people crow, that’s where it rightly belongs.

Children dressed in flour sacks run out in the street without masks or handkerchiefs tied around their faces. Old timers sit outside their homesteads and marvel at the crystal sky. Some folks talk about the punishment from God of Sweetwater’s sins. They never mention how the whole country is hurting. It isn’t just Sweetwater that’s looking for relief; it’s Abilene and Mariposa and Amarillo and the rest of Texas, all the way up to Montana. The grass is growing again there, but who knows if it’ll hold, if the dust won’t come back and ruin crops again.

For now, however, Sweetwater is singing the praises of Mother Earth.

These are the Great Plains, one of the Jackson grandmothers says as Jared and Jensen walk by. Something can’t be so great if it has no chance of growing back.

What does it matter that the entire land around them is brown and gray when the sky above them is so charmingly blue?

Out in town, Jared and Jensen are running errands. Dora has asked for some more lye, and possibly a box of suds if they can spare for it. For the tractor, Frank has asked them both to see if they could get some oil. He’s going to try. This summer. He’s going to try.

“I’ll be sending y’all money on the first of the month,” Jensen details as they reach Preacher’s. “Gonna send it to the currency exchange care to you. You got that?”

“Yes, Jensen. You said this three times before.”

“Well, I’m jus’ making sure.”

“You sure do like to make sure.”

“Did my Aunt say anything?” Jensen nudges Jared with his elbow. “Anything… about us?”

Preacher’s is empty, save for Preacher and Old John Brown, who still has not left. Jensen holds the door open for Jared, who rolls his eyes and walks on through.

Slapping the counter, Preacher lights up.

“Good Lord,” he whistles out. “Here are two welcomed faces. Y’all drinkin’?”

“Are we breathing?” Jared quips and takes his usual seat.

“All right, all right,” is laughed in response while the whiskey pours. “How you boys doin’? Fine day, ain’t it? Awful day for business, but I spose I don’t mind a few more days like these. What say you, John Brown?” At the end of the counter, a sagging John Brown shakes his head and waves them off. Preacher sighs and shrugs. “The god damn President couldn’t snap this one out of it. But it looks like y’all been keepin’.”

Jared would pay money to have his cheeks stop flushing or for Jensen to stop smiling. Jesus.

“Any news from Mariposa, Preach?” Jensen drops a nickel onto the counter. Jared takes his shot. “Nothing else about those boys?”

Shaking his head, cleaning out more glasses with his apron, Preacher replies, “Got nothing for you, Jensen. I’m afraid it’s been quiet—here and there.” Seeing that Jensen is not pleased, Preacher adds, “They seem to have moved on.”

This still is no consolation.

“She knows,” Jared mentions and takes out a nickel of his own for another two shots. “You asked and she knows.”

Preacher takes his time at the other end of the counter to refresh John Brown’s glass.

“Is she upset?”

“No.”

Tawny eyebrows rise. “Really? Jared, are you sure? Are you sure y’all don’t wanna come with? I told you—I said it before, we could take Cole with us. I got some savings Jeff could send…”

“Jensen,” Jared huffs, his shoulders bristling, “I can’t make anyone leave and I sure as hell can’t leave them. We’ve been over this a hundred times.”

“It just makes no sense for y’all to stay. Not anymore.”

“Wheat could come back.” Jared regrets those words as soon as they leave his mouth.

“To hell with wheat! Look at you. Look at them. My aunt’s cough gets worse every day.”

“Is this why…” Jared hisses. “…this why you… so I’d talk to them? Make them go? Is that why you and I…?” He stands and pushes the bar stool away from him.

“That’s not what I’m sayin’, Jared and you damn well know it.”

“So what are you sayin’, Jensen? Remind me, why don’t you.”

“Would you sit back down?”

“No. I’m headin’ out.”

“Jared!”

Two steps outside and Jared freezes up on the sidewalk. Jensen doesn’t expect this, so he bumps into Jared.

Sweetwater is in chaos.

The end of the world is on the horizon.

 

Preacher begs them to stay in the saloon. Don’t get back into the truck. Don’t try to make it back home—let the storm pass, _please_. And for a minute, Jared considers his offer, thinks that it might not be so bad to hold out in the space above the saloon.

But Dora and Frank are home.

And this ain’t like any other duster.

This is a black blizzard unlike anything Sweetwater has ever seen.

It is a predator on a scale unimaginable until now. The little warning they have is spent rushing to load supplies into the truck. Jared doesn’t speak to Jensen. Jensen doesn’t speak to him. The winds are picking up, slamming windows and doors shut and striking everything in its path with torrents of hot, burning dust. Jared no longer has the mask from Dora; he hopes, as he ties a handkerchief over his nose, that she is wearing it now. He hopes that she stays put and doesn’t try looking for them.

All he can do is hope.

 

Cars on the road choke and short out as the storm approaches. The outskirts of the storm are as bad as typical dusters. The center is a raging, whirling, screeching beast headed right for Sweetwater. All the purity of a Great Plains morning is ruined.

There is no more sweet, clear air.

There is no more walking, basking, and inhaling without worry or cough.

There is only dust.

Waves and waves of dust more than ten feet high roam free, unhindered and vengeful, all of it the size of entire farms.

Under Jared’s control, the Model-A gives out halfway home. Jensen gives it two unsuccessful tries. Getting out of the truck to look under the hood cannot be done or risked. Jared remembers that article he read—it is an impossibility.

Currents of dust, soil, and dirt barrel down the treeless, grassless, striped land, consuming fences, homes, and road. It surrounds them completely and utterly. Ferocious and churning higher and higher, the center of the storm arrives in thrashes that beat against the truck. The hood of the truck can no longer be seen.

Everywhere, all around them is only one thing: blackness.

From the hairline cracks in the windshield to the openings in the windows, dust pours in. Jensen begins ripping his over shirt and stuffing it into the windows; Jared gets his senses back and begins doing the same. Every inhale is stifling. His throat scratches and his eyes burn and the sand wraps its fingers around him entirely. It is in his hair, his ears, his nose, and on the tip of his tongue.

This blizzard.

It blacks out the sun.

Jensen shouts out but Jared can’t hear him. The force of the wind and the shred of the sand against the car makes for powerful noise. Jared wants to shout back for Jensen to shut his mouth—he’ll breathe in more sand—but he doesn’t get the chance.

A mailbox slams into the windshield.

Splinters of glass threaten to fly out at them.

By the force of something, the glass holds steady.

Jensen pulls Jared into the backseat. He uses the last scrap of his over shirt to press it against Jared’s mouth and nose. Jared shakes his head in a struggle. No. He won’t let things be this way. Not after all this. Not after losing so much already.

Jared reaches out.

He wrenches them together, nose to nose, mouth to mouth.

They share one breath.

And look at each other.

They share another breath.

And look at each other.

Visibility is zero.

Sweetwater is lost.

 

 

**April 14 th, 1935**

**5:00pm**

Rescue workers from Abilene arrive.

They begin pulling bodies out from cars.

Some of them are alive. Most of them aren’t.

In a beaten up Model-A, they find two men, curled up together, the older one shielding the younger one with his body. They are covered in a solid two inches of dust.

And they are alive.

 

**April 14 th, 1935**

**7:00pm**

Dora went out.

She went out when Frank did not come in and the boys were not home. She thought to look in the barn—just fifty feet away from the house.

She never made it.

So much sand gets into the eyes of an asphyxiated body.

 

**April 16 th, 1935**

Reporters all across the country deem the storm, “Black Sunday.”

In Sweetwater alone, ten are buried.

They bury Dora next to Cole.

Jared ties her hair in a braid.

 

**April 19 th, 1935**

Wheat falls.

Seventeen cents.

Jared and Jensen sleep in the same bed but no one speaks. The house is eerie. A batch of biscuits is not thrown away. None of the pots or pans are moved. They eat beans and pork out of cans.

No one wants to disturb Dora’s things.

It seems like she just stepped out.

 

**April 20 th, 1935**

**Noon**

Frank comes into the kitchen with a shovel after being outside for three hours digging. The pigs hide from him. Jensen stands up. Jared remains in his seat.

“Going to try to get the tractor out,” Frank announces, his voice shot and his entire body filthy with dirt. “You boys… you boys be good.”

Jensen turns away to grab his boots and follow after.

Jared screams.

Frank doesn’t turn towards the garage.

He turns towards the barn.

 _Crack_.

Wasn’t the garage he was digging out.

Was his grave.

 

**April 21 st, 1935**

**Noon**

The President receives dirt blown in all the way from Oklahoma. Ships in New York are stalled from port because no one can see the Statue of Liberty. Scientists all over declare a national ecological disaster.

The rest of the country wakes up.

It starts to notice.

People are dying

People have been dying.

Everyone in Sweetwater with someone to lose has lost. Even Old John Brown loses himself. He puts a bullet into his head near the cemetery, a note left for Preacher.

Jensen’s trunk is packed.

They have fought and screamed at each other until he’s blue in the face. He can’t understand Jared. Not at all. He’s bought an extra ticket at the last minute. The man has nothing left here but an empty house and a list of memories. He’s got to leave. Even if he doesn’t want to go with Jensen—he could go anywhere, anywhere but here.

This is No Man’s Land.

And Jensen is afraid.

He fears for Jared; not because he couldn’t survive the weather, but because if he stays in Sweetwater, all he’ll have are ghosts.

 

Jensen leaves the house for an hour.

He comes back and finds a suitcase on top of his trunk.

Joy is smothered by the fact that the suitcase is open and Jared’s clothes have been scattered in the wind. Jared would never leave his things like that. Jensen shuts the suitcase and loads everything into the truck. How the truck still works is a mystery, but it’ll do. What won’t do is being without Jared. Jensen starts to go inside the house, thinking that maybe he’s still gathering things and saying goodbye.

Then a pig appears.

It flies over from the barn screaming, covered in blood.

Jensen grabs his rifle.

The pig skitters at his feet and squeals murder.

 

**April 21 st, 1935**

**5:00 pm**

Jared hangs from the barn doorway, swinging.

He is alive.

He is choking.

Jensen doesn’t have time to shoot the dark figure running away from the barn and to rescue Jared. So he goes for what matters most.

From a distance of more than thirty feet, Jensen raises his rifle and aims.

Choking.

 _Crack_.

 

A cut runs from Jared’s left ear to his nose. His hands are bloody from the struggle.

 

This is the worst hard time.

 

These are the Great Plains.

On a train the next morning, Jensen carries what is left of his family out of this land.

The pigs never leave Jared’s side.

Jensen doesn’t either.

 

 


	2. Epilogue

 

She met me at the end of the driveway.

Let me clarify—this is Montana. The driveway is a quarter of a mile long. This is ranch country. The closest neighbor is the Morgan Dude Ranch ten miles out, practically another state away.

We exchanged emails for a good six months and this was the first time our schedules have cleared up enough to meet. Hospitality was generous once we figured out the logistics. I was invited to stay for the weekend in a private cabin overlooking a small, man-made pond. It was my first time in Montana; this part of the state might as well be Canada. I could wax poetic all day about the landscape. It’s green. It’s breathtaking and the air here is at least a hundred times crisper and clearer than the air in good old smog city Los Angeles. But you all get the gist. Montana is beautiful. I can see why she’s not fond of leaving it, even for our interview.

The office invited her to come down to LA for a few days so we could do the interview there. This is standard procedure. She declined our first three requests for an interview. Finally, last year, she accepted on the condition that _Times_ come up here for the story.

I was on board from day one.

 

 

Numerous attempts were made over these past six months to get together, but something always came up. My daughter’s dance recital. Her oldest granddaughter’s soccer tournament. The time my apartment flooded. A series of thunderstorms up in Montana that didn’t quit for a week. Eventually, time, nature, and our day planners delivered me further north than I’ve ever been.

With the recent release of _The Dust Bowl_ , Ken Burns’ latest directorial project, Georgina Ackles has spent more than her fair share of time sitting down for interviews. She is one of the twelve interviewees in the stellar, heart-wrenching documentary about a period in American history often overlooked and forgotten. Although the area known as the Great Plains has since recovered from nearly a decade of dust storms and blizzards, anyone who lived through it never forgot about it.

“Daddy never breathed quite right,” Georgina commented as we sat down for dinner the first night of my arrival. “He always had a wheeze to him. Scared my Pop every time the weather turned real cold.”

Just a few hours after I settled in—and started to feel my sinuses clear up from so much fresh air—Georgina and her partner Letty shared with me their family tree. Letty is the daughter of Lee Michael Roster, the only black property owner in Sweetwater, Texas during the thirties. The residents of Sweetwater knew him as Preacher. He also happened to be Georgina’s parents’ closest and longest friend.

“In 1933, my daddy’s first husband passed away in a stampede.” Both women have meticulously preserved every piece and photograph from the time their fathers were young men in their twenties. Over the weekend, I came to know each faded and worn photo, every scrap of dusty fabric, and each memento like the back of my hand. “It was hard on him. It was hard on the whole family. In 1935, my Pop went down to try and convince them all to come up here.”

As anyone versed in American history can tell you, life was rough during the Depression. But it was especially difficult for homesteaers who lived near a patch of land the Roosevelt administration dubbed No Man’s Land. It was the epicenter, the wild heart of the Dust Bowl, subject to dusters and storms daily. In 1934, a record low of only fourteen inches of rain fell.

“It was awful,” Letty added, showing me a picture of her father standing proudly outside of his saloon. “Dad struggled every day to keep his business. Georgie’s Pop lent him ten dollars—a lot of money back then—right after Black Sunday. The windows in the saloon had been knocked out from that wind. All that dust. All that damage. He kept the saloon going for another year after that. I don’t know how, but he did.”

All three men were together in Sweetwater for only three months, before Georgina’s parents were forced to leave. The friends would not see each other for another ten years, in an entirely different country. They met again at the end of World War II, in a café in Paris, just days after V-Day in 1945. A week later, the Montana men would reschedule their flight from New York to Billings. They stopped off Pittsburgh to reconnect with Roster.

“He told me they spent a whole week crying and getting drunk,” Letty recalled over my second dinner with the Ackles family. “It was a good time, though. A good, good time.”

Georgina’s parents were Jared Padalecki-Ackles and Jensen Ackles, men who lived through some of the most tumultuous times in American history. Not ten years after escaping the Dust Bowl, both men were drafted. Luckily, Jensen, who had been a Montana ranger, was able to get them into the same infantry. They left for France together and stayed together, despite a few close calls. Georgina has their medals in shadow boxes, proudly displayed on the fireplace mantle in the main living room.

 

 

Perhaps the best outcome of their service in the war was the adoption of their daughter in 1948. Georgina was three years old.

Showing me pictures of both men throughout the years, some in albums, others in frames around the house, Georgina was glowing. “You couldn’t ask for better folks. They raised me tough and tender. See here? I was thirteen there. Pop had bought me my first horse. When he broke his leg on a fishing trip a week later, daddy showed me how to groom and ride her. He was pissed at Pop, but I think he was over the moon that he was the one who got to show me the ropes of riding.”

In 1960, Jared and Jensen convinced their friend Preacher to move to Montana. He brought with him his thirteen year old daughter. Letty and Georgina are now grandmothers to ten, mothers to six. This June, they’ll celebrate their fortieth wedding anniversary.

One of the most ardent requests from viewers after the premiere of _The Dust Bowl_ was to see more about the descendants of those who lived through it. How did the dust storms affect its survivors afterwards? What was the motivation in leaving or staying? Did they ever go back?

Georgina and Letty were first contacted by Ken Burns’ production team in 2000.

Both of Georgina’s parents passed away in 1995. Jensen was 85, Jared was 80. Preacher passed away in 1990, at the age of 79. He was the first to hold the family’s very first great-grandchild.

All three men passed away from natural causes, in their sleep and at peace.

“It’s been nearly ten years,” Georgina recounted. “Ten years this August and I’ll never forget it. Daddy couldn’t breathe very well the evening before. Pop took out his guitar and played something he never had a name for. He showed my oldest the chords to it. That night, the house was so quiet. Letty woke me up at midnight.”

Letty placed an arm around her partner as we sat on the back porch of the extensive household. “Something didn’t feel right. I said, ‘Georgie, let’s look after the guys.’”

On one acre of land, Jensen started with two rooms, a kitchen, and no electricity when they fled Texas in 1935. Over the years, they expanded, both men successful at raising cattle and working on Morgan’s Dude Ranch. Now, the property has sixty acres, ten rooms and plenty of space for Georgina and Letty’s six children and ten grandchildren. Georgina took over the cattle when Jensen and Jared officially retired at the age of 70 and 65, to spend time with their grandchildren. She runs it today with three of her children, who live in the household and continue to work the land. Letty was a tenured Professor at the University of Montana, teaching American History and Black Studies for more than twenty years before retiring last year.

For most of the weekend, we congregated on the back porch, sitting in rocking chairs Preacher made just two months before he passed. Georgina’s oldest son Frank stopped by periodically with updates on the cattle and orders. All the cattle on the Ackles land are grass-fed and humanely raised.

“If they could have stayed in Texas, I am certain they would have,” Georgina mentioned over late night coffee and s’mores, out on the porch underneath a vast, clear Montana sky. “Most people in Sweetwater never left. The majority stayed. That was how it was done. You stuck with the land, even when the land was in trouble.”

Indeed, the portrait depicted by John Steinbeck in his masterpiece, _The Grapes of Wrath_ , didn’t apply to most people affected by the Dust Bowl. Year after year, even with crops failing and the price of wheat falling to a mere seventeen cents a bushel, people stayed. Jared and his first husband didn’t leave when the grass disappeared. Jared held on for two years after Cole’s death.

In 1963, a bank out of Sweetwater contacted Georgina’s parents asking if they’d like to sell their plot of land to a construction site.

“Daddy was shocked. Absolutely shocked. You see, he thought the bank foreclosed on that property after they left in ’35. Turns out Pop paid the last two payments on the mortgage and never told him. He did things like that a lot. It was his way. He had that pond dug up one weekend when daddy was out of town on business and didn’t mention it when daddy came back. He just let him walk right up to it.”

The construction site paid the Ackles an undisclosed sum of money for their plot of land. Included in the contract was a clause to exhume the bodies of the Ackles buried on that land and have them transported to Montana—Jared’s mother and father in law and his first husband, which happened to be Jensen’s cousin, were all moved.

“My dad was fond of saying when they looked at each other in a room, it was like everyone else was chopped liver,” Letty recalled. “They didn’t like each other at first, according to my dad, but he knew. He knew there was something there.”

That something there lasted sixty years.

 

 

I asked why they left Texas if Jared had survived two years without Jensen or his first husband.

Letty fielded that one.

“Everyone in that town knew my dad—Preacher. They knew he was the man with the word. He had connections to Abilene, to Mariposa, and even as far as Amarillo. He was the only black man with property in town, and he was one of just four people to own a phone. Jensen started to hear about a series of murders where young, white farm hands were being targeted. He brought this up to my dad. When he heard Jensen bought a ticket back here, my dad promised to check on Jared after Jensen left. Understand now, that after Black Sunday, Jared was alone. He lost his mother-in-law to the storm and his father-in-law to suicide. Dad said he’d look after Jared. I knew he would have. But he didn’t have to.”

Jensen was about to leave Sweetwater a week after Black Sunday, a day that turned out to be the worst, most horrific one for everyone in its path. Texas and Oklahoma saw the highest body counts. A serial killer on the loose did not make things better. But Jensen could not force Jared onto the train bound for Montana.

“Jensen came back from dad’s saloon and found Jared dangling from a noose in the barn,” Letty continued, showing me a picture of Jared, taken just six months before he passed. “The killer’s mark was to cut his victim from ear to ear across their face.”

Jared managed to escape the knife, save for three inches from his left ear to his nose. And when the killer yanked a crate from under Jared, his neck did not snap.

“Daddy had these pigs. Tell him about the pigs, Letty.”

At this point, we had moved our conversation inside, around the fireplace in the living room. It was three in the morning. Letty looked over at Georgina and I could see what her father must have seen in Georgina’s parents.

“Jared kept these two pigs, more spoiled than kittens. When Jensen got back from meeting with dad, he looked around for Jared. He couldn’t find him. By the time he would have, he would’ve been too late. But one of the pigs shot out of the barn where the killer had Jared and found Jensen.”

Thirty seconds more and Jared would have suffocated.

They left Texas the next day—the pigs on the train with them.

The scar healed in time, though at eighty years old, I could see a faint trace of it. Jared identified his would-be murderer: a migrant who had helped load groceries in Sweetwater. He was able to provide details for the Sweetwater sheriff, but the man was never found.

“Pop was happy to get out of Texas, it was never his home. But daddy… well, daddy always wanted to go back. They did, once, before the construction started and before our family was dug up. I just remember him crying at the sight of it.”

In Sweetwater, Jared had lived in a two room shack on a five acre plot of land. He eventually came to manage more than sixty acres alongside Jensen. He was the expert on cattle, while Jensen bred and raised champion horses. At the start of their relationship, Jared could not read. Before they left for the war, Jensen taught Jared how to read and write, after the war, he supported Jared in getting his GED. Both men lived long enough to see a telephone in nearly every room of their home.

 

 

Georgina and Letty were the first in their families to finish high school and continue onto university. They each have advanced degrees, championed by their fathers every step of the way.

All three survivors of the Dust Bowl lived to see their great-grandchildren. Around the breakfast table, grandkids and great-grandkids alike chime in about the patriarchs of their family. Dora, the second of Georgina and Letty’s children, recalls a summer afternoon with Jensen, where he showed her how to fish in the pond he and a construction crew made. He told her all about the Depression lines for food and employment, and his brief time spent as a butcher in Chicago before heading out to wild country in Minnesota, Iowa, and eventually, Montana, where he worked odd jobs until becoming a ranger.

Even the latest addition to the family, little Doreen, Georgina’s tenth grandchild, speaks fondly of her great-grandfathers. At six years old, she never got the chance to meet any of these men, but she can retell the turkey story by heart.

“Pop used to tell us all we could be turkey kids,” Georgina laughed as I was given a tour of her garden. “If we wanted to be turkeys, all we had to do was stand outside for a while, look up at the sky, and wait.”

This family has it all. From authors to artists to dancers to accountants to real estate agents to chefs to entrepreneurs to practicing the family business—these three men created an enduring legacy.

Later on, on my third and final day, I helped Letty make a biscuit recipe passed down from Jared’s mother-in-law. It was one of the few things he saved from the shack in Sweetwater. Letty knows it by heart now; the original is kept preserved. As we rolled and pressed, Letty shared, “I get a lot of students asking me what’s the point of studying history.”

I was sad to leave the Ackles. In no time at all, I was one of them. Even though I missed the hell out of my own daughter during my stay, all I wanted to do was breathe a little more clean air.

Writers never have one big epiphany. For us, life is a constant series of little epiphanies—realizations that make our romantic hearts pitter patter.

And that? That was mine.

All I wanted was something better than what I had.

As a first-time father, my life often centers on the chaos and panic of running after my seven year old, worrying to hell and back if I’m making the right choices. Am I raising her right? Am I providing for her now and for her future well enough? I want to give her better.

Letty’s words stuck with me for days after.

“Jared used to tell me that a farmer depended on the word ‘if.’ If it rained. If the wheat grew. If the truck held out. The older he got, the less he liked that word. He didn’t want ‘if.’ He wanted when, where, and yes, that would do. That’s what happened with the Great Plains disaster. That’s what it was—a disaster that spread across hundreds of millions of acres. It was the lack of looking back and learning from mistakes and missed opportunities that caused it. It’s only by looking back that we can begin to understand our future. Study history to study yourself. We are more than what we are on the surface.”

Dr. Letty Ackles had me considering dropping everything here in Los Angeles, grabbing my daughter, and heading back here to sit on the Ackles’ porch and listen to another story about the pigs that traveled thousands of miles across the country without leaving Jared’s side once.

A small section of land with a view of the pond is the resting place for the Ackles.

There, are simple, sturdy headstones for each relative. An hour before my departure, I visited, guided by Georgina and Doreen. Doreen skipped ahead and laid down bundles of wildflowers for every headstone—one for Frank Ackles Sr., Dora Ackles, Cole Ackles, Jared Padalecki-Ackles, Jensen Ackles, and Lee Michael “Preacher” Roster.

“Whenever daddy’s breathing acted up, Pop would take him out here and they’d sit for hours. He would rub daddy’s back and make him drink water. It took years for daddy to gain weight, to adjust to living here, and to really accept this place as his home. They worried, when they left for the war, would it be different when they came back? Would they come back?”

Georgina will be buried here.

It’s stated in the will she shares with Letty, who has the same wish.

I left on a Monday morning, full of pancakes, bacon, and coffee so good it would make the most bitter Los Angeles resident smile. It felt like leaving a place I’d been to a thousand times before.

This is the story of what happened to just one of the many families affected by the Dust Bowl. Those who have carried on carry with them the spirit of resilience forged out of dust.

Before we headed back to the house, Doreen stood by the edge of the pond and looked up at the sky, holding her arms out at her sides and opening her mouth.

I caught myself doing the exact same thing.

\--May 2005

 

 

 **Author’s Note** : Three months after the publication of this article—a year after the release of _The Dust Bowl_ —Georgina and Letty Ackles were contacted by a 77 year old woman outside of Alton, Illinois near the Missouri border. She read my article, which led her to Ken Burn’s documentary, and got on the phone.

A month later, Lily Tillman was reunited with her niece. In 1931, her family was broken up after the market crash and a series of family tragedies. Just three years old, she was sent to a foster family outside of St. Louis. A scientist and accomplished poet, she settled in Alton, retiring in 2000. She had one letter and one letter only from any of her five siblings. It was written by Rosalita Morales, a schoolteacher in Sweetwater, dictated to by a then sixteen year old Jared Padalecki.

Lily passed away a year after finding her brother’s family.

She is buried next to her brother.

\--January 2007

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so many of y'all requested a little something extra, so here it goes. 
> 
> all the images are credit to Google. 
> 
> uhm, i'm also not a journalist, so i hope this reads like a magazine article. ;-; 
> 
> i have to say, i have such a soft spot for this story. but i think this does it justice. and we get some more answers. <3

**Author's Note:**

> omg! it's done! PHEW.
> 
> okay, first things first: thank you to my artist and to M and T for beta'ing/hanging on with me there at these three in the morning nights when i was all omg and y'all were all it's okay!
> 
> here's a link to the amazing art by cybel: http://archiveofourown.org/works/3264038
> 
> i've tried to stay as historically accurate as possible but you know... it's still fic. april 14th, 1935 is historically accurate. men getting married and being out together is not. also, no man's land was technically in OK and this is TX, but you know... 
> 
> a nod to "Out of the Dust" by Karen Hesse and "The Worst Hard Time" by Egan and the Ken Burns documentary "The Dust Bowl." those were my primary sources for this. i also have to say that i drew a lot of inspiration from Lonesome Dove and The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. :D
> 
> thanks for reading! i'm going to crash now. this is one of my favorite stories.


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